Perseverance
by Naruto7thHokage
Summary: Unlike many of my stories, Naruto will not be godlike so close to the beginning and will take a lot of time to achieve such power. Naruto will have perfect chakra control and sensory in the beginning though. In the far future, he will get many new abilities, but I'll let you guys learn that later.
1. Prolouge

**This story, unlike my others, will not be godlike right off the back and you will see Naruto's progression at a slower rate. The only thing I give Naruto off the back is perfect chakra control, but even then, it takes him some experience to achieve it. But later on he will achieve more than cannon. I am a believer that Naruto deserved more than what he had. Sure he received sage mode of the Rikudo Sennin, and all the tailed beasts, but I though he deserved more than that. I mean, look at Sasuke, he received the rinnegan and he didn't really earn it. Naruto on the other hand worked with sage mode, and worked with Kurama before he got the others. Sasuke had everything handed to him and sure he lost all his family, but so did Naruto. The only difference is that Naruto grew up without love and Sasuke had love but lost it in the form of his brother's actions. Without further ado, he is my new story.**

The glares, the whispers, they all carried hate. How would you feel if everyone despised you? If they didn't give you the time of day. How would it feel to grow up without the love of your parents or family? The pain that comes with it is terrifying. It is horrible how humans can harbor so much hatred and can let it out on a child. The only thing worse is not knowing why people hate you. People can hate you without you knowing why and it will hurt more than if you didn't know. At least if you know why people hate you, you can at least try to understand them. But humans can be so horrible, and scary beyond anything you imagined. Especially in a world when walking on water and breathing fire is normal. This is one of the hardest things to remedy in the world.

Hatred.

Such a simple idea, yet it holds much more power behind it. Hatred can sever bonds and not let them repair. The only remedy to hatred is love. Love can heal pretty much all mental wounds. Sure, there will still be scars. But without scars, we can forget the past and it could continue to occur, hurting more the time after the next.

Uzumaki Naruto, victim of hatred, holder of care and love. This young, blonde, boy has been hurt by the village since his birth and he only seeks to help them. The scars from the past remain, but he will always care for the village he was born in. Not because he cares for the people, at least not yet. But because he seeks to prove them wrong by being stronger than them. To change one's mind, you must show them, without a doubt, that you possess the answers to their pain. All hatred stems from pain.

5 years ago, Konohagakure was attacked by one of the fiercest creatures known in the world. The Kyubi, bearer of nine tails, has the power to decimate mountains and cause tsunamis with its tails. It just so happens that our young protagonist was born on this day. It is due to these two things that Naruto is hated. The blonde doesn't know it, but the Kyubi was sealed within him using fuinjutsu by the Yondaime Hokage.

In the present, the reinstated Sandaime Hokage allowed him to join the Shinobi academy (I prefer to say shinobi instead of ninja because the people in the Narutoverse are way more exposed than that of a ninja, and a shinobi is basically a ninja warrior I guess). At this time, said Hokage is walking Naruto to the academy. One thing about the Sandaime is that he cares for Naruto just like his own grandson. He possesses empathy for the boy and wishes to give him love that the village so easily takes from him.

Outside the academy are the various children seeking to become shinobi because their parents or because said parents wish for a better life for them than that of a citizen. When Naruto and the Sandaime, Hiruzen Sarutobi, arrived at the academy, the various parents began glaring at Naruto and were only stopped by a glare from the Hokage. Hiruzen took Naruto to the classroom to which he would spend 7 or so years in.

Sliding open the door, Hiruzen and Naruto came to see a young adult chunin with a scar over his nose, brown eyes and hair, wearing the standard chunin uniform.

"Greetings Iruka-kun, this is Uzumaki Naruto." Hiruzen greeted with his smile that always seemed to be on his face.

"Greetings Hokage-sama, and I look forward to teaching him." Iruka replied with a smile, internally seething at Naruto. Don't get me wrong, he doesn't hate the boy, but he doesn't like what is inside him, he, unlike many, understands the power of fuinjutsu especially in the hands of the Yondaime.

Naruto the entire time hid behind Hiruzen, seemingly afraid like he could sense the anger in Iruka.

"It's okay Naruto-kun, Iruka won't hurt you, he is here to help you become a shinobi." Hiruzen stated to soothe Naruto's fear.

Naruto came out from behind the old kage, "H-hi…Iruka-san."

The hatred inside Iruka dissipated, this boy was just that, a boy. What he saw of the Kyubi vanished, this boy was just as much a victim as him. Iruka now disregarded everything he knew of the Kyubi.

"Hello Naruto-kun." Iruka replied with a smile, getting the old kage to smile as well.

Naruto instantly got happier because he felt the anger around Iruka disappear (Naruto will have enhanced emotion sensing).

"Well…Naruto-kun, do you want to find a seat? Everyone else won't arrive until a little later." Hiruzen stated.

Naruto nodded and moved to the center of the room at the table closest to the teacher's desk. He knew this would be a good time, and he would learn a lot.

 **I won't have Naruto graduate this chapter so you guys decide if he graduates early or if he graduates like cannon except without the scroll scenario because I plan for Naruto's skills to naturally be better. But here was the prologue, I hope you review and give some pointers that I may take to improve my story.**


	2. Chapter 1

**Here is chapter 1 for Perseverance, I hope you enjoy.**

Naruto waited in the classroom for his future classmates, and just read a book that the Hokage gave him a week ago. The book was about being a shinobi, what it entails, basic abilities, and basically a description of the job. He waited for about 10 minutes before the others began filing into the room. The only time he put the book down was when Iruka began speaking.

"Welcome guys, you have begun your journey onto the path of a shinobi. Through the years, you will acquire abilities that are standard for all Konoha Shinobi. First two years will focus entirely on history, math, language, and things like that." Iruka stated while looking around the room, inspecting his students. "To start off, we will introduce ourselves, and next please get out the books inside your desk; and turn to page 5."

The sounds of books opening and pages turning took over the room until it stopped once everyone got to where they needed. "Okay, starting with you…Ame Kusari (Just made up, any students name will be random), please tell us your interests and dream." Iruka said and said girl replied with her dreams and interests, and they moved on to the next until everyone finished their explanation.

Iruka then looked to his own book, "I will begin reading, and I may pick on one of you to take over. Okay;" Iruka began reading, "The shinobi world is one of great peril, and it is our job to assure you are well-prepared. This book will teach you valuable aspects of a shinobi's career. Most importantly, you must learn of the past, proper math skills for bukijutsu, or the skills with weapons." Iruka paused to allow the students to understand. "Chapter 1: History; The shinobi was told to have started long ago, with our skills stemming from that of the Rikudo Sennin. Most jutsu you know off stem from his teachings of chakra, which you will learn of in your third year. His sons, Asura and Indra, were taught everything their father knew, which was control of the elements which has come to be known as Ninjutsu." Iruka paused once more. "Sasuke, please start reading about the formation of the clans."

Sasuke nodded with a smile and began, "The original clans, including the Uchiha and Senju, both of which founded Konohagakure, fought with each other for many years. This period was known as the Warring States Period. And the issues began to calm down when the Uchiha and Senju came together to form our village. In the end Hashirama Senju was chosen for Hokage after him and Madara Uchiha fought a great battle." Sasuke continued to read until the point of Hashirama's demise, which is when Iruka asked Naruto to read.

Naruto smiled as he began to read, "After Hashirama's passing away, his younger brother, Tobirama Senju, became the Na-Nidame Hokage," Iruka interrupted.

"It is Nidaime Naruto-kun." Iruka corrected with a chuckle.

Naruto sheepishly smiled, "Sorry sensei," Naruto continued reading, "Tobirama-sama was well known for his abilities of water ninjutsu. He was able to pull water from the air for his jutsu, which no one else could do. He led the village until he gave himself up on a mission for his allies to escape. After his allies returned to the village, Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Sandaime was chosen to lead the village." Naruto continued until the point of the Kyubi incident to which Iruka began to explain it himself.

"On October tenth, a tailed beast attacked us. Can anyone explain what a tailed beast is?" Iruka asked, getting a series of shaking heads, "Well, a tailed beast is a great entity of power. They are a construct of chakra that are nigh-unstoppable. We were attacked by the strongest, the Kyubi. We lost our Yondaime to the beast after he defeated it. Afterwards, the Sandaime retook his post as Hokage." Iruka finished as he looked to the clock, and saw it was almost time to dismiss to lunch. "Alright boys and girls, it is almost time for lunch."

Almost every student cheered, except for Naruto who merely smiled. Iruka got saddened at Naruto's expression and could see underneath that he only wore a mask to hide his true emotions, the mask was so good that he almost didn't notice it. The students were released outside to eat their lunches, and Iruka called Naruto over to him.

"What's wrong Naruto-kun?" Iruka asked.

"Nothing Iruka-sensei, I'm okay." Naruto stated while strengthening his mask so Iruka didn't worry.

"Okay Naruto-kun, do you have any lunch?" Iruka asked, and saw the boy's mask shake.

"No sensei, I can't afford lunch." Naruto replied with a smile.

"What do you mean? Don't you live in the orphanage?" Iruka asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I got kicked out a year ago, Hokage-jiji gave me an apartment though." Naruto replied.

"Why were you kicked out?" Iruka asked, nearly letting his eyes water at the pain in the boy in front of him.

"I don't know sensei, just one day they told me to grab my stuff and leave and to never come back." Naruto replied with a smile.

"Well, let's go get you some lunch." Iruka stated with a smile, "Have you had Ichiraku's yet?"

"I love that place sensei, Teuchi-jiji and Ayame-nee are really nice to me." Naruto replied, jumping up in down in happiness.

"Okay Naruto-kun, let's go before it is too late." Iruka prompted Naruto and it was practically a race with Naruto winning by a long shot. That boy was really fast.

Iruka and Naruto sat on the stools of Ichiraku Ramen, and called for Teuchi.

"Hello Naruto-kun, Iruka-san. What can I get for you guys?" Teuchi asked while wiping his hands with a rag.

"I'll have three bowls of shrimp ramen Teuchi-jiji!" Naruto excitedly replied.

"I'll have a bowl of miso ramen Teuchi-san, thank you." Iruka politely replied.

"Coming right up." Teuchi replied.

After they returned to the classroom, everyone began filtering in, returning to their seats. They then continued the day by finishing reading chapter 1.

 **-2 years later-**

The whole two years passed by quickly, especially since Naruto took in every piece of information and just held it in, consuming it like it was ramen. So far he was the rookie of the year, far outclassing Sasuke Uchiha. And now the students were outside and Iruka was directing them in the process of unlocking their chakra.

"Feel within, look for the flame inside you that is located in your abdomen. When you find it, pull it out, pull as hard as possible." Iruka directed the various children sitting around in a meditative stance.

The first to accomplish this was Naruto, and when he did, everyone was knocked out of their meditation by the wave of energy that was released. And the thing was that Naruto was still releasing chakra, and it was starting to become visible. Iruka tried to wake him, and only succeeded when he used his own chakra to stick to the ground and walk against the wave of visible chakra.

Iruka managed to reach Naruto and grab his shoulder. "Naruto-kun!" Iruka yelled over the loud noise of the wind.

The chakra stopped pouring out of Naruto when he awoke. "Yes Iruka-sensei." He replied with a smile.

"Naruto-kun, you were releasing more chakra than I have in my body. And you awoke the others from their meditation." Iruka replied, motioning to the other 7 year olds.

Naruto rubbed the back of his head and smiled sheepishly, "Sorry guys."

"Well, you will have to work on control more than the others. You have so much chakra and I doubt you can control it." Iruka stated.

"Hai sensei." Naruto nodded.

Now this wasn't favoritism, as Naruto was dangerous with his large quantity of chakra, and seemingly no control. It was merely a safety measure. Naruto sat there as everyone else tried to unlock their chakra, and Iruka walked up to him with a scroll. (Naruto may have control, but that doesn't matter unless you know how to work you chakra.

"Here Naruto-kun, this scroll possesses some chakra control exercises. While the others are unlocking theirs, I want you to work on controlling yours." Iruka ordered.

"Hai sensei." Naruto replied before opening the scroll.

On the scroll read, 'leaf-balancing', and he read how to accomplish it. Basically, the user has to focus their chakra into a point of their body and balance a leaf just above their skin. So he began after picking a leaf off of the leaf-littered ground, and he stuck it to his forehead, which the scroll recommended to start. Following the scrolls directions, Naruto began to focus his chakra into his forehead and begun to spin his chakra one way and creating an opposite spin to create a magnet-like system. After he stabilized the swirl, he stuck the leaf to his forehead and it immediately shot off. He was genuinely confused, so he looked to the scroll to see that it said if you put in too much chakra the leaf will be launched away.

" _So too much chakra_." Naruto thought.

The blonde then lessened the amount of chakra being sent to his forehead and tried again after he picked up a leaf from the ground without looking. He stuck the leaf up once more and it stuck. He then opening his eyes and the leaf shot off.

" _I lost focus._ " Naruto thought again.

He kept his eyes open and tried to multi-task by keeping the leaf on his head as he walked around. This process took him until the last student unlocked their chakra and Iruka started them all on the leaf-balancing exercise. Almost all the students got it by the end of the day and by then everyone was dismissed to leave.

"Naruto-kun," Iruka called as the blonde almost left the room, "It appears your control is greater than I thought. Sadly, I can't move you along without it appearing that I favor one over the many."

"That is fine Iruka-sensei that just gives me more time to master it." Naruto replied with a smile.

" _I do believe you will become an exceptional shinobi Naruto._ " Iruka thought, "Well, I'll see you tomorrow Naruto.

Naruto waved goodbye and ran out the room. He quickly made his way to his apartment so he could do some more chakra control exercises, so he grabbed a few leafs along the way. On the way to his apartment though, he came across the Uchiha compound. And the guards weren't there. He entered the opened gate and saw some more bodies. In the distance he saw someone on the roof about to jump down so he ran as fast as his little legs could take him. He made it to where the masked man was and saw him with his sword inside someone's back. The shinobi faced Naruto who maintained a strong composure, but was very nervous on the inside.

"What are you doing?!" Naruto questioned, with a glare.

"That is none of your business, Naruto-kun." The shinobi responded.

"Weasel-nii?" Naruto questioned, "Why are you doing this?"

"It is nothing you would understand, run away and cling on to your life." Weasel, or rather, Itachi Uchiha, told Naruto.

"Please, stop this! It isn't too late." Naruto urged.

"No, Naruto-kun, I must do this and not even you will stand in my way." Itachi replied, and dashed and he kneed Naruto in the stomach.

The air in Naruto's lungs suddenly found itself gone, and Naruto kneeled to the ground and coughed up blood. "Please, you must stop, this isn't you."

Itachi ignored Naruto's words and vanished, most likely to continue his mission. Naruto pulled himself up, and went to find Itachi. He found Itachi inside the clan head house with Fugaku and Mikoto at the tip of his sword. In one swift move, Fugaku and Mikoto were headless and fell to the floor, Naruto's mouth went dry and he fell to the floor. Suddenly, Sasuke opened the door to find Itachi standing over his parent's corpses and Naruto on his knees.

Sasuke was quiet before Itachi turned to face him, "Why did you do this nii-san? Why did you kill everyone? Please answer me!"

Itachi appeared in front of the raven-haired academy student and poked his forehead, "Naïve little brother, you are weak and you aren't even worth killing. To answer your question, I killed them to test my eyes." Itachi's eyes spun from the sharingan to a three-pointed saw, "You are weak, seek me out when you have the same eyes as me. Hate everyone, curse everyone, and you will become powerful."

Somehow, Naruto sensed that Itachi was about to use a jutsu so he jumped in front of Sasuke and looked into Itachi's eyes, and suddenly regretted it. Itachi's eyes put Naruto into one of the most powerful genjutsu, known as Tsukuyomi. He saw the deaths of the Uchiha clan over and over again for what seemed to be hours. He appeared back in the room from before to see Itachi staring wide-eyed at Naruto.

"How are you still standing?" Itachi asked, and Sasuke was just standing behind Naruto and was questioning why Naruto would jump in front of him.

"Any genjutsu can or cannot be felt, my will stopped most of the pain. I couldn't let Sasuke see that, and I know you can't do it again yet. I could feel the chakra consumption in the genjutsu." Naruto replied, and Sasuke just realized that Naruto just jumped in front of him to stop a sharingan genjutsu from reaching him.

"No problem, I'll just kill you both then." Itachi replied. "I can't let any witnesses out."

"Yes you can, you wanted to in the first place. I feel that you wanted to spare Sasuke so he could tell the convincing story. The only benefit from this is killing me. Nobody cared about me in the first place, but I'm will to sacrifice myself for Sasuke, unlike you." Naruto replied.

Itachi's and Sasuke's eyes widened and Itachi spoke up, "You're clever Naruto-kun, I'll let you live."

Itachi then vanished as Naruto fell to the floor and Sasuke immediately helped him up. Sasuke then asked, "Why did you help me?"

"Because, I knew after this, you would know the loneliness I feel." Naruto replied as he fell into unconsciousness.

Sasuke was now conflicted, his brother told him to hate everyone and he would get powerful. But Naruto cared for him, and he could withstand a sharingan genjutsu. He resolved it, he would help Naruto and others and he would get powerful to help them and uncover the truth of why Itachi committed this crime. He carried Naruto outside, looking at all the bodies once more, he would avenge them. Once outside the gates, he laid Naruto down until ANBU arrived. He didn't have to wait long when 4 ANBU landed on the ground.

"Uchiha Sasuke, what happened?" One of the ANBU asked.

Sasuke remembered Naruto's words, Itachi wanted him to report him, but he wouldn't soil his name. "The Uchiha clan has been murdered, it happened before I got home, so I don't know who did it." Sasuke replied with tears threatening to fall from his eyes.

"Grab my hand Uchiha Sasuke." The same ANBU ordered.

Sasuke put his hand on Naruto's shoulder and his other in the ANBU's hand. They appeared in the Hokage's office.

"Hokage-sama, my team and I spotted these two outside the Uchiha compound, we were told by Uchiha Sasuke that the whole clan was murdered but they do not know by who, and I told 4 other ANBU to recover the bodies of the fallen Uchiha." The ANBU reported.

The old kage's eyes widened, " _Danzo, you power-hungry bastard._ " He then told the ANBU, "Thank you for taking them to me, report back to the compound and assist the others and make sure no body is disturbed." Hiruzen ordered.

Naruto's eyes flickered open after Hiruzen said that, "Where am I?" Naruto asked out loud when the ANBU vanished.

Sasuke replied, "We are in the Hokage's office."

"Are you okay Sasuke?" Naruto asked with concern in his eyes.

"Yes, are you?" Sasuke replied then asked, getting a nod.

"Hello Naruto-kun, how are you feeling?" Hiruzen asked.

"Disturbed, disgusted, angry…weak." Naruto replied quietly.

Both inhabitants of the room looked curiously at Naruto, "What do you mean?" Hiruzen asked Naruto.

"I watched as Itachi did what he did, and I couldn't do anything about it. That is my least favorite feeling, I feel responsible. I could've helped in some way, but I was slow, weak, and just couldn't do anything." Naruto replied, and Sasuke began looking sadly at Naruto.

"Naruto, it's okay. I doubt either of us could've done anything. After all, we are both academy students." Sasuke sadly stated.

"You both are only just starting you shinobi careers, I suspect the one who did it was alone. And someone who could defeat the Uchiha clan by themselves is not too messed with. You are both lucky to have survived." Hiruzen replied.

Naruto jumped up, "I don't want to be lucky! I want to survive because I have the power to! Not because someone spared me!" Naruto yelled.

"Naruto…you have just started out, no one will expect you to defeat high-level shinobi already." Hiruzen replied calmly.

"Hokage-jiji, I have to go. Sasuke…I'm sorry about what happened." Naruto replied.

"Naruto…perhaps you are a better brother than Itachi and I don't even know you that much." Sasuke stated with a sad smile.

"Thanks Sasuke, don't hesitate to ask me for help." Naruto stated as he left the room to go to his house.

When he unlocked his front door and entered, he locked the door behind him and went to his bed. He pulled out the leaves in his pocket and placed one on his forehead and continued with the leaf-balancing exercise. He didn't sleep at all, because he thought that if he did he would just see the Uchiha again. He resolved to become stronger to protect the village and everyone in it. When he focused on his chakra, he unknowingly absorbed the chakra from the leaf. The difference was so abysmal that he didn't notice. He also unknowingly became distant to almost everyone, only being happy when around Sasuke, Iruka, the Ichiraku's, and the Hokage. But despite this, he still radiated happiness. He may not be happy, but his mask became more powerful than ever.

 **-1 year later-**

Naruto's class has begun to learn Taijutsu and theory of Ninjutsu. This included learning the academy katas, learning the principles of jutsu such as the shape and nature transformations. They also learned of the different natures, which ones are more common where, and different things about Taijutsu.

Right now, the class is outside doing spars. "Uzumaki Naruto, and Uchiha Sasuke." Iruka called the two students to the ring. "Extend the seal of confrontation." Iruka told the students, and they put their right hand in a half tiger seal. "Hajime!" Iruka called out for the two to begin their spar.

Sasuke charged first and jumped, bringing his foot down on Naruto. Said blonde dodged the kick and as soon as Sasuke touched the ground he kicked Sasuke's feet from out from under him. Sasuke quickly regained balance by landing on his hands and launching himself up. Naruto didn't let him rest and jumped at Sasuke. The back of Naruto's left foot swung around and connected with Sasuke's right forearm. Next Sasuke brought his left fist around and attempted to punch Naruto, but Naruto's right hand caught the fist and threw Sasuke over his shoulder. Sasuke landed and launched himself at Naruto once more and slid while trying to kick Naruto's feet from under him, but Naruto jumped and Sasuke expected this and kicked upwards towards Naruto. Naruto kicked off the incoming foot and flipped backwards and landed in a three-point landing before jumping at Sasuke who was just getting balanced. Naruto locked his left leg around Sasuke's and brought his left palm around to push Sasuke to the ground and succeeded.

"Good job the both of you, exceptional performance. Now use the seal of reconciliation." Iruka congratulated then told.

Both of the students locked their index and middle fingers around the other's like a handshake. "Good fight Sasuke." Naruto said with a smile.

"You too Naruto, still haven't beaten you yet." Sasuke replied with a smile.

"I'm sure you will in the future." Naruto replied with a chuckle.

"Now let's go inside to finish our lessons on Ninjutsu." Iruka told the class who were recovering from the amazing spar between the top two students.

The rest of the day, they learned from Iruka and left when the last bell rang. Sasuke and Naruto walked out together towards the Uchiha compound. Sasuke finds comfort in the compound, and it is only because of Naruto's insistence of honoring his family. Sometimes he would even visit the house of his other family members to sit and bathe in the memories he shared with them.

Naruto and Sasuke arrived at the training grounds of the Uchiha compound and they began talking.

"Have you mastered the fire jutsu yet Sasuke?" Naruto asked.

"I believe so, I am able to form a considerably sized fire ball over the lake." Sasuke replied. "Have you?"

"I think so as well, wanna compare?" Naruto asked with a smirk.

"Sure." Sasuke replied.

They both walked over to the lake and Sasuke stepped up to the dock and went through the hand signs Snake → Ram → Monkey → Boar → Horse → Tiger, and breathed in a great amount of air to where his chest began to swell. After about 10 seconds, he release a mid-sized torrent of fire. Naruto looked on in amazement.

"Great job Sasuke." Naruto told him.

"Thank you. Your turn Naruto." Sasuke replied with a smile.

Naruto stood where Sasuke did and went through the same hand signs and gathered air in his lungs, and after a bit, released it in a larger ball than Sasuke's.

"How did you produce such a large amount of fire?" Sasuke asked with an open mouth.

"I train the leaf-balancing exercise for long amounts of time. I just use that in conjunction with Fire Release chakra and I control my chakra into a necessary amount of chakra without using too much. How long have you trained in chakra control?" Naruto replied then asked.

Sasuke rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, "Not very often."

"Well I'm sure if you practice chakra control more often than you can create as much fire as me. I have larger amounts of chakra, but you have a better fire affinity, so it basically negates it." Naruto replied with a smile.

Sasuke chuckled, "Thanks Naruto. Do you want to practice with some shuriken now?" Sasuke asked.

"Sure." Naruto replied.

Sasuke took Naruto to where Itachi once took him to teach him shurikenjutsu. "Itachi took me here once for some lessons, and Shisui took him here before that. Can you believe Itachi used to skip the academy to train here?" Sasuke laughed.

"Itachi? I didn't take him for one to skip class." Naruto chuckled.

"So he taught me this cool trick to bounce one shuriken off another to get it to go around. I believe it went like this." Sasuke said as he took out two shuriken to demonstrate what he ment.

Sasuke threw one shuriken with ease and threw the other at a different angle and the second bounced off the first and hit near a target on a stone, with the target being on the opposite side of the stone as them.

"He did it with such ease, I'm still amazed by his skill." Sasuke said, then gained a sad expression.

"Skill comes with practice Sasuke, and don't think about it. We both know he didn't want to do it." Naruto assured him.

"I know, it is just hard to forget." Sasuke replied, looking over his shoulder.

"You shouldn't forget it anyways, it will serve as inspiration to get stronger." Naruto replied with a smile. "How do you think I improve? I don't want that to happen again, so I train to stop the chances of that happening."

"I am still amazed how wise you seem." Sasuke chuckled.

"I just learn from what hurts me Sasuke." Naruto replied, his smile almost slipping.

"Okay, well then let's get to learning then." Sasuke chuckled once more.

"Yes, let's." Naruto replied with a laugh.

The rest of the day was spent trying to hit the targets they couldn't see. When it was almost nine at night, Naruto said his goodbyes and was on his way to his apartment. When he got there, he got onto his bed and began trying to attach more than one leaf to his body. It turns out that learning the fire jutsu helped him improve his focus, perhaps he should ask the Hokage for some games of shogi or go. But when it was almost eleven, he stopped his efforts when he succeeded in getting a total of two leaves on his body.

In the mornings, Naruto always gets up early to get to the Uchiha compound. The first thing he does is take a shower then eat a small breakfast. His attire includes a sleeveless blue hoodie over an orange shirt that had a red spiral in the center, with blue shorts and blue shinobi sandals and a bag he wears over his right shoulder. After he cooked himself some bacon and toast with eggs, he ate it and immediately left to get to the Uchiha compound.

Along the way, he pondered of how his relations with the lone Uchiha have increased since that night. Compared to then, they were now like brothers in all but blood. They make each other grow, and Naruto loves having a brother. Ever since that night, Sasuke has deemed them rivals, and they compete in almost everything, but never get mad when one beats the other.

They are both capable of using the Fire Release: Great Fireball Jutsu, and they both mastered the academy katas along and are almost close to mastering shurikenjutsu. Naruto arrived at the compound and entered to see Sasuke exiting his house.

Naruto waved to Sasuke, "Good morning Sasuke."

Sasuke got closer to Naruto and replied, "Good morning Naruto, how are you?"

"I'm great, how are you?" Naruto answered then asked.

"I'm great as well, we should be heading to the academy." Sasuke replied with a smile.

The two of them walked slowly to the academy to have some small talk, and within 20 minutes they made it to the academy. Since they were really early, no one was there and they just decided to work on chakra control. Naruto reached into his bag and unsealed some leaves for them. Another thing Naruto took to learning was fuinjutsu, seals were very handy and Naruto realized this many a time.

For the hour they waited, they sat in silence with a leaf, or leaves in Naruto's case, until anyone showed. When seven-thirty came, Iruka along with his assistant, Mizuki, arrived. It was almost eight in the morning when everyone was just now getting in the room and Naruto decided to continue working on it, so he just kept one leaf on his chest during the whole day.

"Sasuke do you mind if Shikamaru sits with us?" Naruto asked.

"I don't mind." Sasuke replied.

"Hey Shika, you wanna sit with us for a bit?" Naruto asked.

Shikamaru shrugged and moved to sit with them.

"How does some Shogi sound?" Naruto asked, and Shikamaru shot up.

"You play?" Shikamaru asked with wide-eyes.

"I'm starting too." Naruto replied while motioning for Choji to sit near him so he wasn't alone.

Shikamaru pulled out a board so quick you would've thought he used summoned it from the table. During the lesson, Naruto and Shikamaru played as they payed attention, and because of such Iruka didn't stop them. After Shikamaru told Naruto how to play, Naruto caught on pretty quick. Although despite how fast he caught on, Shikamaru was always a couple moves ahead. He sought to beat the lazy Nara in what they did best, but he was going to work on that later.

Right now it was lunch time and Naruto and Sasuke were sitting near a tree, with Shikamaru and Choji sitting with them today. Sasuke was happy to have more friends, despite them barely knowing each other. The day ended quickly and Sasuke and Naruto said goodbye to Choji and Shikamaru.

Naruto and Sasuke returned to the Uchiha compound and went to the training ground. For an hour they would train in chakra control before working on physical exercises such as punches and kicks. After they did one hundred of those, they would run around the compound five times, and after that they would try and learn a new jutsu. After all, having a library created by a jutsu-centered clan was very handy.

It was around eight in the evening when they got to the library. They went to the Fire Release section since Sasuke didn't have enough chakra for the other natures just yet. The jutsu they found was the **Fire Release: Demon Lantern** , and the hand signs were Dog → Horse → Tiger. They spent until nine trying to learn it, but they only got to the point of making various tiny fire balls, and couldn't yet form the demon shape; a sign that they needed to practice with shape manipulation. But when it was nine, Naruto said his goodbyes and went back to his apartment.

 **-2 years later-**

Both Naruto and Sasuke were now 10 years old. Both were more highly advanced than their class. They were already the level of a genin, which surprised Iruka how fast they were progressing. Naruto and Sasuke both knew with current patterns that chances were that they were not going to be placed on the same genin team with them both being tied for rookie of the year since they were both maxed out in their grades. This thought saddened them, since they were wanting to progress with each other. But they put those thoughts aside to think about class.

The class was now going over genjutsu and the required jutsu to graduate, the **Substitution** , **Transformation** , and **Clone**. And despite Naruto's control, he could not make a clone to save his life, the most stable clones he could make were well over one hundred, even nearing one thousand. Through the years, Naruto and Sasuke mastered the **Great Fireball Jutsu** , the **Demon Lantern Jutsu** , and they learned 4 others, two per year. Those four were the **Dragon Fire Jutsu** , the **Dragon Flame Release Song Jutsu** , the **Fire Dragon Bullet Jutsu** , and the **Fire Dragon Flame Bullet**. They both mastered all six of the six jutsu and the other 3 except Naruto couldn't do the **Clone Jutsu**.

 **-2 years later-**

Today was now the day of the graduation of Naruto's class. He and Sasuke were now high-genin level, and still rapidly rising, only thing limiting them is experience and proper testing. High-genin is their own assessment, nobody helped test them since they wanted to hide their skills. They started learning the **Strong Fist** Taijutsu made famous by Konoha's Might Guy. Another thing that occurred was that during their daily training, Sasuke awakened his sharingan with one tomoe in each eye.

Iruka began calling students into the exam room, and then Iruka called out one of the last names after Sasuke walked back in with a blue Konoha headband around his forehead.

"Uzumaki Naruto…"

 **There is the first actual chapter, I hope you enjoyed and that you leave a review to help with decisions of the direction of this story. Please review and come back for chapter two later.**


	3. Chapter 2

**Welcome to chapter 2, I hope you enjoy.**

"Uzumaki Naruto…" Iruka called to Naruto.

Naruto nodded to Sasuke who passed him as the raven-haired student was smiling. Iruka led Naruto to the examination room and made it there in about 30 seconds. Naruto saw Mizuki sitting there, and he also felt Mizuki's anger directed at him. Our blonde kept his calm façade and stood in the center of the room. He looked up and saw a chakra disrupting seal, and but his right hand in the half tiger seal.

"Kai." Naruto said out loud.

"What was that Naruto?" Iruka questioned as Mizuki was internally panicking.

"I felt a chakra disruption seal on the ceiling." Naruto replied while looking at Mizuki.

"Well, please get along to preforming the jutsu please." Iruka stated.

"Hai." Naruto replied.

Naruto saw Iruka throw a kunai towards him and substituted with Mizuki's chair, making the white-haired chunin fall. After getting scolded by Mizuki, Naruto went back to the center of the room. Seallessly, Naruto transformed into Iruka, ever tiny detail being copied upon Naruto. Something special with Naruto's transformation is that if he uses enough chakra, he actually transforms into that person.

"Iruka, I can't really make small quantities of clones." Naruto stated.

"What do you mean?" Iruka asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I have too much chakra to make small amounts of clones, the smallest amount I can do is over one hundred." Naruto replied.

"That's right. Well then, just make one hundred then." Iruka resolved.

Naruto shrugged and without seals once again, he filled the room up with clones of himself.

"Great job Naruto-kun." Iruka congratulated as he handed the blonde his forehead protector.

Naruto nodded and went back to the class. When he entered said classroom, he immediately went to Sasuke.

"Now we have to wait and see if we might end up on the same team." Naruto said with a sigh.

"Well at least we are almost genin." Sasuke replied, he knew of the second test administered by the Jonin sensei.

"Yup, which means closer to rising in ranks." Naruto replied with a smile.

"Do you want to try and learn a jutsu of a different nature today after we are dismissed?" Sasuke asked.

"Sure, you should have enough chakra now anyways." Naruto replied with a smile. "Maybe we should do lightning."

"Sounds good Naruto." Sasuke replied.

The class was shortly dismissed, and Naruto and Sasuke went to the Uchiha compound. They were told to report back in a week to get their team assignments. But they made it to the training ground and Naruto went to the library as Sasuke sat down to work on chakra control a bit with leaves. Naruto returned with a scroll labeled **Lightning Release: Electromagnetic Murder**. The two began to read the scroll and they finished reading at the same time.

Naruto and Sasuke both went through the hand signs Boar → Ram → Snake → Horse → Dragon at the same time and thought of the name. Both students created a wave of lightning, with Sasuke creating a larger wave.

"It appears your lightning jutsu are more powerful than your fire." Naruto assumed.

"It appears so." Sasuke replied.

"We should work on this jutsu until our team assignments." Naruto suggested.

True to Naruto's words, they worked on that one jutsu the entire week.

At the end of the first day, Naruto was approached by Mizuki. The blonde could felt the hatred from the white-haired chunin.

"Hey Naruto, could I talk to you?" Mizuki asked with a fake smile.

"You already are, but okay." Naruto replied.

Mizuki scowled on the inside, "There is a secret test, and it allows the rookie of the year to move up to Chunin. I was wondering if you'd like to take it."

"What does it include?" Naruto asked.

"Basic espionage, recovering of a scroll." Mizuki replied.

"When does it take place?" Naruto asked, he could feel the deceit from Mizuki.

"Tonight." Mizuki replied, Naruto nodded and Mizuki told the mission to Naruto.

Naruto quickly made it to the Hokage Mansion and got inside. He slipped past the ANBU and made his way to the Hokage vault. He figured out the vault was in the Hokage's library and that said vault was locked by seals. He used his knowledge of seals and unlocked the vault, and opened the door. He saw a lot of scrolls, and a large one that was his goal. The scroll was labeled 'Scroll of Seals', deciding to get more than the big scroll, he pulled out a scroll and formed ten fire clones. In about ten minutes, Naruto copied most of what was in the vault and took the scroll to where Mizuki told him to.

Naruto arrived in the clearing of a forest and put the scroll on the ground and opened it, first seeing ' **Kage Bunshin** ' and this caught his attention. He read the jutsu and quickly mastered it in about 10 minutes. He unrolled the scroll further and made some **Kage Bunshin** to read the other parts of the scroll. By the three hour mark, Naruto learned about 5 jutsu, all were more complicated than the **Kage Bunshin** , and the first to arrive was Iruka.

"Why did you do this Naruto!?" Iruka questioned.

"What do you mean? Mizuki told me if I learned a jutsu from this here scroll that I could become Chunin." Naruto said with a raised eyebrow, inwardly laughing at his acting skills.

"Don't tell me you read the scroll." Iruka stated.

"I may have, and learned six jutsu." Naruto replied while rubbing the back of his head sheepishly.

Iruka's eyes widened, "S-six jutsu?" Iruka asked.

"Yup." Naruto replied.

"Good job Naruto, now hand the scroll over." Mizuki, out of nowhere told Naruto.

"Don't think so traitor, I knew of your plans from the start. You were going to take this scroll to Orochimaru." Naruto replied, and Iruka turned to Mizuki with wide-eyes.

"Don't look at me like that Iruka." Mizuki told the other Chunin while detaching a fuma shuriken from his back. "It was only a matter of time this happened."

"But why!?" Iruka asked.

"Because. This village is weak and I want it gone." Mizuki replied and smiled, "Naruto, do you know why the village hates you?"

"Mizuki it is forbidden!" Iruka shouted.

"On October tenth, when the Kyubi attacked. It couldn't be killed so it had to be sealed, into an infant, that infant was you. You are the demon fox! Hahaha!" Mizuki stated with a maniacal laugh at the end.

"Are you dumb?" Naruto asked getting a snarl from the Chunin, "You know nothing of the sealing arts, do you? If you seal a kunai into a scroll, does the scroll become the kunai?" Naruto asked.

"Shut up demon fox, I will kill you before I return this scroll to Orochimaru-sama and this village will get destroyed!" Mizuki shouted with an insane look in his eye.

Mizuki had the air knocked out of him, "This gives me full rights to bring you down, I got a confession and a witness." Naruto stated with a glare.

Mizuki glared at Naruto, "You brat!"

The white-haired Chunin jumped towards Naruto, and the blonde ducked under a punch from Mizuki. He knew that as he was now, he'd be lucky to defeat Mizuki. But then he put his hands in the tiger hand sign and launched fire from his mouth. " _ **Fire Release: Great Fireball Jutsu**_." Naruto thought.

Mizuki was surprised at Naruto preforming a C-Rank jutsu and an elemental one at that. In his shock, he wasn't able to dodge so he was blasted away into a tree. The impact knocked Mizuki out and Naruto and Iruka appeared before his body.

"You go on home Naruto-kun, I'll take the scroll and Mizuki to Hokage-sama." Iruka told Naruto.

"You sure Iruka-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"Yes, and by the way, good job." He paused, "And I'm sorry that Mizuki lied, you can't become Chunin because of this."

Naruto smiled, "I already knew that."

"Then why did you take the scroll?" Iruka asked.

"So Mizuki would reveal himself." Naruto replied with a shrug.

"We maybe can't make you Chunin, but sure do act like one." Iruka stated with a smile.

Before they knew it, it was the day of team assignments. Both genin-hopefuls were walking to the academy, and like usual were the first there. They also sat there and worked on chakra control like usual. Naruto was using four leaves and Sasuke was using two. Iruka entered the room before everyone else just like usual as well and smiled at their constant training. Before long, all the graduated students arrived in the room.

"Alright guys," Iruka got their attention, "I'm proud to say that I trained you all. I hope you make our village proud, and start, team 1 is…" Iruka called all the teams to team 6, "Uzumaki Naruto…Uchiha Sasuke…" Naruto and Sasuke high-fived, "and Haruno Sakura." There was a loud response.

"In your face Ino-pig!" Naruto and Sasuke's pink-haired teammate shouted.

"Sakura, please be quiet." Sasuke requested.

"Yes Sasuke-kun." Sakura said as she sat down.

"Your team Jonin is Hatake Kakashi. Team 8 is Hyuga Hinata, Kiba Inuzuka, and Shino Aburame, Jonin Instructor is Yuhi Kurenai. Team 9 is still in circulation. Team 10 is Yamanaka Ino, Akimichi Choji, and Nara Shikamaru, led by Sarutobi Asuma." Iruka paused for assurance of everyone hearing his words, "Your sensei will be here shortly to pick you up. Just once more, I hope you all know you make me proud."

Team 7 waited in the room. It has been three hours, and Sasuke and Sakura appeared to be getting aggravated.

"Probably should have told you guys this earlier, but Kakashi-sensei is always late to everything lower than an S-Rank mission." Naruto informed with his eyes closed and five leaves on his body.

"You think?" Sasuke madly replied.

"I'm sorry, it slipped my mind Sasuke." Naruto stated with a laugh, getting a playful glare from Sasuke.

After Naruto said that, the door opened and an eraser fell on the new persons head. Sasuke looked to Naruto.

"When did you do that?" Sasuke asked, along with Kakashi thinking the same thing since he had a clone study them and it didn't see Naruto set it up.

"When the last person left." Naruto shrugged while the leaves floated to his hand.

"My first opinion of you guys is…I hate you." Kakashi stated, "Meet me at the top of the building."

Naruto was the first to get up and leave, "Let's go guys." Naruto told his teammates.

The other two were quick to follow and they all walked to the top of the building. In about 3 minutes, they arrived at the top and Kakashi spoke.

"Sit down and let's introduce ourselves." Kakashi told his students, after everyone sat down he spoke again, "You first blondie."

"My name is Uzumaki Naruto, I like training, spending time with my brother," He looked to Sasuke, "I dislike traitors, anyone who judges before getting to know that person, and death. My dream is to have my face engraved up on that mountain." Naruto finished by pointing to the Hokage Monument.

Sasuke began next, "My name is Uchiha Sasuke, I like training and spending time with my brother," Sasuke looked to Naruto, "I dislike traitors as well, as well as sweets. My dream is to revive my clan." Sasuke finished.

Sakura began, "My name is Haruno Sakura, I like…*giggles*, my dream is…*giggles*, I hate Ino-pig and Naruto!" Sakura finished, and each time she giggled she looked to Sasuke.

"What? Why do you hate me?" Naruto asked, acting with fake hurt.

"You take Sasuke's attention from me." Sakura replied.

"Have you ever thought that you annoy him? Or that he doesn't like you like that?" Naruto asked, getting wide-eyes from Sakura.

"W-What?" Sakura asked.

"You just make it seem like Sasuke is forced to love you, you didn't give him a chance." Naruto replied.

"…" Sakura couldn't find anything to say.

"If you guys are finished, tomorrow morning I want you three to meet me at training ground 7. Oh, and I'd advise you not to eat breakfast." Kakashi didn't give them a chance to ask anything else as he vanished.

Sasuke and Naruto shrugged and walked away, leaving Sakura to her thoughts. Both genin walked back to the Uchiha compound, and went to the training ground like always.

"Hey Naruto, I want to read up on something, you can work on anything you'd like." Sasuke stated.

"Okay then, well, I'll come say goodbye around 9 then." Naruto replied.

Naruto left to go find something in the library and he looked for some Taijutsu scrolls. He found one labeled 'Strong Fist', and took it and began to read. He found the concept was simple, strong hit, fast hit. It was the style used by Konoha's Might Guy and Rock Lee. Naruto took the scroll outside and began practicing the katas. By nine he remembered all the katas, and now he just had to put it together. He went to go find Sasuke and found him in the library.

"I'm going home Sasuke." Naruto told the raven-haired genin.

"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow." Sasuke replied, not looking up from his scroll.

Naruto then walked to his apartment, and walked slowly, as to take in the calm atmosphere. He reached his home in about thirty minutes and went inside and repeated his natural routine; get ready for bed, get in bed, put leaves on body, meditate. He "woke" up around 6 and realized Kakashi wanted them there by 10, or 7 like the Jonin said, but Naruto knew he'd be three hours late.

Naruto got ready for the day and went to the Uchiha compound. He retrieved Sasuke and both Genin walked to training ground 7 to see Sakura sitting near a tree. She smiled at both of them and waved. Naruto realized they got there around 8, so they might as well come up with some plans.

"So guys let's come up with some plans. Kakashi is going to test us using two bells and will tell us that only two of us can pass. But standard teams have at least three Genin. And did you guys eat?" Naruto asked.

"Sensei told us not too." Sakura replied.

"He advised us not too." Naruto retorted. "A shinobi cannot perform at top condition without food. With that being said, Sakura you need to get off a diet." Naruto informed.

"But then I'll get fat." Sakura stated, getting a snort from Naruto.

"If you're training you won't. If you train you'll burn off all those calories." Naruto retorted.

"He is right Sakura." Sasuke spoke up.

Sakura nodded, and Naruto got six leaves to continue practicing leaf-balancing.

"Why do you do that Naruto?" Sakura asked.

"Unlike you, I have large reserves of chakra I need to make sure I don't lose control of." Naruto replied.

Naruto opened his eyes and put his foot on the tree, " _Okay, I need to mold my chakra into somewhat of a suction cup._ " Naruto thought to himself.

When he felt he had the right amount of chakra, he placed his other foot on the tree and he was now parallel with the ground. Naruto continued to take more steps and made it to the top of the tree.

Sasuke and Sakura simultaneously asked, "How did you do that?" After which they both looked at each other.

"I molded my chakra into the soles of my feet and made it into somewhat of a suction cup." Naruto replied while sitting on a branch near the tree.

The other Genin tried what Naruto did and they attempted to walk up the tree. The other two didn't notice but Naruto still had his leaves on him when he was walking up the tree. By the time Kakashi arrived he saw his students walking up and down the trees.

"Am I missing something?" Kakashi asked.

"Just teaching them a little something." Naruto replied.

"Tree-walking?" Kakashi asked.

Naruto nodded and jumped down, with Sasuke falling on his back when said raven-haired Genin tried to get down. "So where are the bells?" Naruto asked.

"You did your research." Kakashi stated while pulling them from his pouch, "Since it is nine, you guys have until twelve to get these bells. Whoever doesn't get one goes back to the academy."

When Kakashi said start, Sakura and Sasuke jumped into the tree line. However Naruto just stayed there, smiling. He then had his right hand in the half tiger seal, thinking " _ **Fire Release: Great Blue Fireball Jutsu**_." Kakashi was surprised by the large blue fire ball and could feel the heat while about 20 feet away. " _Put in enough chakra and it goes past white-hot_." Naruto thought.

When Kakashi got around the fire, he saw that Naruto had disappeared. " _It appears Naruto informed them of the purpose of the test. Since they know it they pass, but I want to test their power._ " Kakashi thought.

Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura were in the forest. "Okay, so just going over the plan. Sasuke, you will throw a large amount of kunai and do your technique. Sakura, when Kakashi-sensei is unaware, I want you to put this seal onto sensei." Naruto said as he handed Sakura a seal he created. "And Sasuke, when I go to release another fireball, I want you to shock him from behind."

Both Genin responded with a "Hai!" and jumped to complete their mission. Naruto saw Sasuke throw all his kunai, and some bounced off of others and nearly hit the Jonin. Sasuke released a **Great Fireball Jutsu** and Surprised Kakashi as a Genin shouldn't have that much chakra to perform that jutsu, Naruto excluded since he was a Jinchuuriki. When Kakashi slid to a stop, he didn't have enough time to respond when Sakura put the seal paper of Kakashi and his chakra was now disrupted. Naruto hopped out and repeated his hand sign from before and spit out another fireball of the same caliber. Kakashi didn't notice Sasuke go through his hand signs for the **Lightning Release: Electromagnetic Murder** and paid the price as he was shocked and blasted away by fire.

The Jonin wasn't too injured, as Naruto didn't put as much power into the fireball. But when the Jonin woke up, he was against the log in the training ground.

Naruto jangled two bells, "We win sensei." Naruto told him.

"Who will you give the bells to?" Kakashi asked.

"My teammates, I will sacrifice my life for them." Naruto replied with a smile.

Kakashi smiled and thought, " _You would be proud of your son sensei._ " And said, "Good job guys, you pass. We are now team seven."

That night, the Jonin were reporting to the Hokage. They were standing in a room with barely any light.

"Like always we are waiting for Kakashi." Hiruzen sighed.

After that was said, Kakashi appeared in a leaf Shunshin. "Reporting." The silver-haired Jonin said.

"Okay, starting with team 1…" Teams 1 through 6 reported failure, "Team 7…"

"Passed." Kakashi said, while not reading his orange book which surprised many people just as much as his statement.

"I bet Sasuke carried the team." One of the other Jonin stated with a smirk.

"Why do you think that?" Hiruzen asked.

"Because he was rookie of the year." The Jonin replied.

"To be exact, he and Uzumaki Naruto tied for the position." Kakashi said.

Hiruzen nodded, "That is true, they are truly both prodigies."

Kakashi scoffed, "I think 'prodigy' is putting it lightly."

"Why do you say that?" Hiruzen asked.

"Both of them were capable of performing C-Rank Ninjutsu, they used the time I had them wait to devise a plan and defeated me like _I_ was the fresh Genin." Kakashi replied.

"Please tell us everything that occurred." Hiruzen requested.

Kakashi nodded, and went on to talk about how Naruto spit out a large blue fireball towards him, Sasuke used amazing precision with his kunai similar to how Itachi did, and Sakura snuck up on him and put a seal tag on him that disrupted his chakra, and Sasuke and Naruto finished it off by both using an elemental Ninjutsu, Sasuke a lightning, and Naruto a fire. All the people in the room were flabbergasted, three rookie Genin defeated their sensei in under an hour.

Hiruzen continued by asked the other teams, being 8 and 10 how they did and they passed, and every left seeing as how everyone reported.

"Kakashi, please come here." Hiruzen requested.

"Hai Hokage-sama?" Kakashi replied.

"I want you to teach these Genin the best you can, make them stronger than everyone else. I'm looking forward to making Naruto-kun my successor and I don't want his teammates forgotten." Hiruzen stated.

"Understood Hokage-sama." Kakashi replied with a smile.

The next day, team 7 reported to the same training ground at 8. Like the day before, Kakashi didn't arrive until nine, so for the next hour they continued working on chakra control. Naruto's control seemed to increase dramatically since yesterday. He could now attach 15 leaves to his body and also run up and down trees. The day after graduation, when he was told of Kyubi, he didn't really care. He trusted the Yondaime's sealing capabilities. And the Yondaime trusted him, and he wouldn't let him down. So for all last night, he created 5 Shadow Clones in his apartment and they all worked on walking on the walls and attaching leaves to their body.

"Hello my students. Today we are working on team training." Kakashi told team 7.

"What are we training in?" Naruto asked, seemingly excited which didn't surprise Sasuke.

"We are going to find out your nature affinities, and Genjutsu because I don't know if you guys know any Genjutsu." Kakashi responded as he got out three slips of paper and handed one to each Genin. "This paper was bred from trees grown with chakra, therefore it is highly sensitive to chakra. If it burns you have a fire affinity, if it soaks you have a water, if it crumbles to dust you have an earth, if it wrinkles you have a lightning, if it cuts in half you have a wind. Now channel chakra into it."

Sakura did it first and the paper soaked. Sasuke did it next and it wrinkles then burned to ash. Naruto went last, and it was the most surprising, it cut into two, wrinkled, and then burned. Naruto suspected this was because of his training in fire jutsu and lightning jutsu.

Kakashi then told them their affinities, "Sakura you have a water affinity, best suited for defense. Sasuke, you have a fire and lightning, both offensive natures. Naruto, you have wind, fire, and lightning, a surprising combination. Not many people have more than one affinity when they're Genin. So now, you will work on you affinities then at about five, we'll begin working on Genjutsu."

The Genin nodded and went to their own corner of the training ground. After Kakashi told them what to do for their affinity, they went to work immediately.

"Sakura." Kakashi called.

"Hai sensei." Sakura replied.

"Before you go too into this, I want you to increase your reserves by walking up and down the trees. As it is now, you have civilian level reserves, capable of only performing E-Rank jutsu." Kakashi told her.

Sakura deflated a bit at this but nodded nonetheless, "Hai sensei."

Kakashi looked to his other students and saw Sasuke with a leaf in his hand, trying to burn it. When he looked to Naruto, he was severely surprised. The blonde created about 30 Shadow clones and had 10 work on each element as he was reading a scroll.

"Naruto, where did you learn the Shadow Clone Jutsu?" Kakashi asked with a serious look in his eye.

"Scroll of seals, Mizuki tried to take it through me and I learned something from the scroll before Iruka arrived. Didn't the Hokage tell you?" Naruto replied than asked.

"I just wanted to ask you myself." Kakashi replied. "Well keep at it, with this many clones you'll master it quite fast."

"Hai sensei." Naruto replied.

The scroll Naruto was reading was what he copied in the Hokage's vault. He was reading the First Hokage's journal at the moment, he read about the fight he had with a man named Kakuzu of Taki. He also read his accounts on the fights he had with Madara Uchiha. He put the scroll away when he finished reading it. Another scroll he copied was a scroll of jutsu, these jutsu though were of advanced chakra natures that Konoha-nin saw. Various elements include crystal, magnet, wood, and many more. But he decided to leave that for later, right now he was going to work on increasing his reserves.

The blonde took off his orange sleeveless hoodie and black shirt and got to work inscribing his body with various seals he learned of, and had a clone do it, as it was rather difficult to write correctly upside-down on yourself. The seals that were placed on his body included resistance seals, gravity seals, and chakra seals. The first two are self-explanatory, but the chakra seal locks away part of your chakra and hinders your control that way when he released the seals, he would have more control of more chakra. As soon as he finished the seals, the clone dispersed itself and Naruto put his right hand in a half tiger seal to activate the seals.

Naruto immediately felt the results, his body was pulled to the ground and he felt tired. Despite this, he stood up and reached for leaves to begin the leaf-balancing exercise as he also began physical exercises. Despite his efforts to hinder his control, it didn't work at all, he still had the same control. But at least with less chakra, he could work on controlling all of it.

Kakashi walked over to Sasuke who was already making great progress with his leaf. Sasuke was already able to scorch it with his chakra.

"You know Sasuke, I also have a lightning affinity." Kakashi brought up.

Sasuke looked up with a tired look in his eye, "Really?"

"Yup, I am quite surprised to see an Uchiha with another affinity other than fire." Kakashi told his student.

"Yeah, me and Naruto found out I had a lightning affinity the day after we graduated when we learned a lightning jutsu. But I want to work on my fire affinity to honor my family." Sasuke stated.

"Well, I'm gonna go check on Sakura, keep up the good work." Kakashi stated with an eye-smile.

Kakashi walked over to Sakura and inspected how she was doing.

"You're doing good Sakura. With your chakra control, and later when you bring up your reserves, you will make a great medic-nin and genjutsu specialist." Kakashi told the pinkette.

"Thanks sensei." Sakura thanked.

"I have a way to increase your reserves quicker, but it is a bit painful." Kakashi told his hopeful student.

"Really? What is it?" Sakura curiously asked.

"I can place seals on you that force an increase in you chakra production which will stretch your chakra coils. But I can't do too much because it could kill you." Kakashi replied.

"Would I be able to get these seals today?" Sakura asked.

"Maybe after the end of today's training, the process will leave you tired." Kakashi stated.

"Hai sensei." Sakura stated with a new vigor.

Kakashi smiled and moved to the center of the training ground to sit and read his little orange book, occasionally giggling like a school girl. It was now almost five and Kakashi put his book away to look at his students again, seeing that Naruto's clones nearly finished their exercise and were now working on chakra control. Sasuke finished his exercise, most likely a little after Naruto. And Sakura was sitting against a tree, breathing heavily most likely due to chakra exhaustion.

When it reached five p.m., Kakashi called over his students, "Come over here guys."

Every member of team 7 got up from their exhaustion and walked over to their sensei.

"Eat these pills to recover your chakra, and after that we'll begin with Genjutsu." He handed a pill to each student and they ate it. "Okay, first step of Genjutsu, learning how to control the movement of someone else's chakra using your own. Various ways to deploy Genjutsu include eye contact, sounds, pills, and many more." He paused for a second, "The first thing we'll work on his disrupting powerful genjutsu. You're up first Naruto."

Naruto stood across from Kakashi and the Jonin spoke again, "This Genjutsu is deployed through the use of words. And is not easily disrupted." And with those words, Naruto was inside the Genjutsu.

Naruto felt nothing, he saw nothing, and he felt lost. But then he felt a source of energy, the Will of Fire. Within 20 seconds, Naruto was out of the jutsu.

"Since Sasuke has the Sharingan, he can easily dispel any Genjutsu. So you're next Sakura." Kakashi said, with Sakura moved to be across Kakashi. " **Demonic Illusion: Tree Binding Death**."

Sakura felt something behind her looked behind her to see a tree sprouting from the ground. After the tree fully grew, branches began to constrict the young girl. To get out of the jutsu, she bit her lip enough to draw blood.

"Good job Sakura, genius idea using pain to break the jutsu." Kakashi congratulated.

"Thank you sensei." Sakura stated while nursing her lip.

For about 3 weeks, team 7 did a large number of D-Rank missions, to precise they did 40 so far. And in that week, team 7 grew in power individually and even more as a team. Sakura grew her reserves to that of a Chunin, with her perfect chakra control as well. Sasuke has become proficient in the use of Fire Release, and has begun learning his family's Taijutsu. Naruto has nearly mastered his three affinities but a lot of progress could be made, he also made progress with the Strong Fist Taijutsu. Kakashi was proud of his students, amazed by how much they have grown in 3 short weeks.

Kakashi has recommended a C-Rank for his team and he knew they were ready.

"Come in Tazuna-san." The Hokage told the client.

A drunk old man entered the room holding a bottle of liquor. "This is what I paid for? I thought I asked for shinobi not children."

The same old man felt a blade touch his neck, "You know, I don't threatening people, but if you insult my team, I'll hurt you." Naruto said as he was leaking Killing Intent.

"Sorry shinobi-san." Tazuna worriedly replied.

"It's okay Tazuna-jiji." Naruto stated with a smile, "I wouldn't have hurt you anyways, it wasn't that serious."

The Hokage then informed team 7, "You guys are to lead this man back to his home in Wave Country so he can build a bridge to protect him against thugs."

Team 7 nodded and they responded with a synchronized "Hai!"

 **So there is Chapter 2, I hope you enjoyed. Please leave a review or PM me, as it really helps.**


	4. Chapter 3

**Here is Chapter 3, I hope you enjoy. Also, the blue fire Naruto used in the last chapter I have decide to change to the original color for future purposes.**

Naruto got back home to seal the necessary materials for his estimated month long trip. As he packed, he thought of all that happened in his short life. He was orphaned on his birthday, got put in an orphanage that hated him, got kicked out of said orphanage, got an apartment from the Hokage, went to the shinobi academy, graduated top of his class, and is now about to leave his home village.

He looked around his apartment to see that is has the bare minimum of decoration. The only things adorning his house were the rare pictures he received. One with him and the Hokage when he entered the academy, one with the Ichirakus, and one with his new genin team. His house had some pretty bad furniture, but it was better than nothing. The couch was a black leather with many holes in it. The kitchen was very empty, barely any food inside. His room was somewhat decent, as his bed was a queen-sized, his closet had a small wardrobe, and he had a small TV.

Naruto grabbed what little clothes he had and sealed them in a scroll that he would place in his overshirt. After he sealed his extra pairs of outfits, he got dressed in some fairly new clothes. His shirt was a mesh shirt with loose sleeves that reach his elbows, over the mesh shirt was a black no-sleeved shirt that had a hood. On his lower body he wore black ANBU pants with black shinobi sandals that reached the bottom of his pants. On his hands were gloves that were reminiscent of the standard Jonin, that being fingerless gloves with metal plates on the back of the hand. The difference of these gloves were that they reached his elbows as well.

Before he left, he checked his seals that held his kunai and other weapons. His seals were located on his palms for quick access. After he checked to see if he had a good amount of weapons, he was on his way to the East Gate.

When he arrived he only saw Tazuna who was drinking some hot tea. Naruto walked up to the old man and waved.

"Hello Tazuna-san." Naruto greeted.

Tazuna smiled like Naruto totally didn't threaten him with a kunai, "Hello Naruto-san."

"How are you?" Naruto asked.

"I'm fine, how are you?" Tazuna replied then asked as well.

"I'm fine as well. Have you ever played Shogi?" Naruto replied then asked again.

"Maybe once or twice. Why do you ask?" Tazuna asked.

"Would you fancy a game?" Naruto requested.

"That actually sounds good." Tazuna replied.

Naruto put his hands in the cross hand seal (Kage Bunshin hand sign) and a clone sat down with the man as he pulled out a scroll to read. Tazuna raised his right eyebrow but decided not to say anything. The scroll Naruto was reading was about the various Kekkei Genkai and their capabilities. He put away the scroll when he sensed Sakura was almost there.

When the pinkette arrived, Naruto asked her, "How are you Sakura-san?"

"I'm good Naruto, how are you?" Sakura replied with a smile.

"I'm good as well." Naruto answered with a smile as well.

The group sat there until both Kakashi and Sasuke showed up at the same time. When the whole group was there they set out on their first mission outside the village. For the most part, Sakura and Sasuke were admiring the scenery, while Kakashi and Naruto were looking out for threats, for surprisingly the same reason. Both the Jonin and Naruto thought Tazuna was lying about something and they had a bad feeling.

Before they left, Kakashi ordered his students into a formation. Sasuke in the front, Naruto and Sakura on the sides of the client with Kakashi in the back. The reasoning behind this was that with Kakashi having the most experience, he could look over his Genin and see if they were handling the outside world well enough as well as look over their line of sight so they didn't miss anything. Sasuke was in the front because he was the first line of defense against frontal assault. Naruto was in the center since he would be able to sense around everyone, and Sakura didn't really have a necessity in the middle.

About 20 minutes out, Naruto and Kakashi noticed a puddle of water. Both of them knew it hadn't rained in a long time, and Naruto looked back to his sensei who nodded to him. This was the first thing Naruto thought of when they were attacked.

Twenty seconds after they passed, two figures came up from the water and charged Kakashi and shredded him using the chains that connected them. One of them had shoulder-length, wild dark-brown hair and dark eyes. He wears a rebreather that covers the lower half of his face and a large, clawed, poisonous gauntlet on his left arm which had a chain coming out of it. The other had shoulder-length, wild dark-brown hair and dark eyes. He wears a rebreather that covers the lower half of his face and a large, clawed, poisonous gauntlet on his right arm which had a chain coming out of it.

Naruto thought he noticed these two from a bingo book he once nabbed from his sensei. His eyes widened, "Gōzu and Meizu of Kirigakure, formally Chunin trained by Zabuza."

Neither of the two rogue shinobi responded to Naruto, but except they charged him instead as he most likely knew of their abilities more than the others. But before they made it, Sasuke landed on their gauntlets and pulled a kunai and shuriken from his pouch and threw the shuriken to lodge the chain against a tree and the kunai was thrown after to make sure it couldn't be removed. After Sasuke knew it was locked in place, he placed his hands on the gauntlets and kicked outwards, hitting them in the chin.

"You're such a show-off." Naruto muttered under his breath as he ran towards the two Chunin and prepared to kick one in the gut and was preparing a **Fire Release: Great Fireball Jutsu** to launch into the other.

Sasuke saw what Naruto was doing and retreated and was prepared to make sure none of them got away. Naruto's right foot successfully connected with Meizu's gut and after it did Naruto had his hands in the tiger seal and gathered chakra in his lungs. He breathed outwards when he converted the chakra into Fire Release Chakra, and a fireball was launched from Naruto to Gōzu. The fireball hit the unprepared Chunin due to said Chunin not expecting Naruto to be able to perform a C-Rank jutsu.

Both Chunin were down for the count and Kakashi came out from the woods and spoke up while clapping.

"Good job taking initiative Naruto, Sasuke. Good job defending the client Sakura." Kakashi said with an eye-smile, "I'm proud of how you guys dealt with that. But it should never have happened." Kakashi finished while staring at their client with disapproval leaking from his voice.

"I'm sorry Kakashi-san, my country could only afford a C-Rank. Listen…we are being wrongfully controlled by a treacherous man known as Gato. He is draining the town of our money and resources." Tazuna replied while looking to the ground, "I'm sorry for my mistakes, and now my daughter and grandson are going to be sad because the Konoha shinobi turned down the mission."

Kakashi rolled his eye, "We were already going to continue on, and my Genin are already Chunin-level in strength. They will be fine behind me."

Tazuna looked among the shinobi team with a smile, "Great! Now we have to hurry to my town."

Tazuna led them to a boat that was along the river and held down on the land. "Hurry Tazuna-sama." The man who was with the boat whispered.

The team got on the boat, and Naruto was holding his head in pain.

Kakashi placed his hand on Naruto's back, "What's wrong Naruto?"

"This mist is chakra-laced, it's Zabuza." Naruto replied in a whisper to Kakashi.

"I thought he'd be here." Kakashi told Naruto, "Watch over your teammates, defend them with your life."

Naruto nodded as they passed under an uncomplete bridge. Tazuna decided to tell them what it was.

"That is the bridge we are trying to make, the reason why we sought out your help, to defend us as we built it." Tazuna told them.

"It's amazing Tazuna-san." Sakura told the old man.

"Thank you Sakura-san. And we all contribute to it." Tazuna replied.

"You truly are an amazing group of people, just like the people of Konoha." Naruto stated with a faraway look in his eyes.

" _I'm surprised he would say that considering all they did to him_." Kakashi thought.

Naruto continued, "The people of Konoha stand together when necessary to help one another and it is truly inspiring."

Everyone nodded at that statement and decided to just look forward. Naruto wasn't as empty inside as he was on the outside. The poor blonde was thinking again what they did to him, but he kept telling himself they were only still grieving. He understood them, he lost his parents and everything he could've had, but not what he has right now. He still has the Hokage and his good friends. When Mizuki told him he housed the Kyubi, he responded with his mask. On the inside he finally realized why people hated him, and that was when he began to understand them. At that time, he deduced it was the Yondaime to seal the beast within him, and his belief in his hero shook but remained. Naruto just thought the Yondaime trusted him with holding the Kyubi and Naruto wouldn't let the late Kage down.

While he was thinking, they arrived at the Land of Waves and the feeling of dread approached them. This feeling put everyone on edge, even making Naruto throw a kunai to a bush when it rustled even a little. He went to the bush to see a small white rabbit, " _Wait, white rabbit, substitution._ " He thought, "Get down!"

Naruto heard his sensei shout and got as low as possible to see a blade sail over him. He looked to see that Sasuke pulled down Sakura and Kakashi pulled down Tazuna. Naruto inspected the blade that continued on to lodge itself in a tree. The craftsmanship heavily favored Kiri origin, it was the Kubikiribōchō wielded by Zabuza Momochi.

Kakashi spoke once more, "Zabuza, Missing-nin of the bloody mist, formally of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist."

"Glad to know I am famous." Zabuza stated with a noticeable smirk through the bandages over his mouth. Zabuza had light grayish skin, short spiky black hair, dark brown eyes, and small eyebrows. He was seen wearing bandages like a mask over the bottom half of his face. He wore his forehead protector sideways on his head, he was shirtless, with his chest only covered by a belt to which he attached his Kubikiribōchō, wearing baggy pants with the striped pattern typical of Kirigakure and mimetic wrist-warmers extending up to his elbows, with matching leg-warmers. "But everyone also knows you, Kakashi of the Sharingan."

Sasuke's eyes widened, " _Sharingan, must be implanted since sensei isn't Uchiha._ "

"It's easy to remember the one who murdered his whole class." Kakashi told Zabuza.

Zabuza chuckled, "One small feat of many."

Kakashi put his hand on his headband and pulled it up to show a three-tomoe Sharingan under the headband.

"Ooh, Sharingan right away, I'm honored." Zabuza sarcastically remarked.

"You should be, not many see this eye." Kakashi retorted, "You three stay back and protect the client."

The three Genin nodded and moved to surround Tazuna. Kakashi then stood across from Zabuza before Zabuza's right hand went into a half tiger seal and his left arm shot to the sky. Chakra-laced mist rolled over the six people.

"Be careful, he's a master of silent killing." Kakashi warned his students.

Zabuza's voice resonated through the mist, "Larynx, spine, lungs, liver, jugular, subclavian artery, kidneys, and the heart," Zabuza paused, "Which one will I choose?"

Kakashi sensed Zabuza a little after Naruto did, and Naruto reacted first because of it. Naruto felt Zabuza behind him and release a kunai from his right hand's seal and thrust it into the gut of Zabuza. The missing-nin was surprised, but so was Naruto when the crazy swordsman turned into water, but also felt something coming towards him but it stopped and he looked behind him. Behind Naruto was Kakashi blocking Zabuza's giant sword with a kunai. Naruto reacted quickly and forced his teammates and client to move backwards. He put his hands in the infamous cross hand sign and he made 4 clones to go help his sensei. Despite his training, Naruto's clones were quickly sliced through by Zabuza.

Naruto could notice Kakashi's subtle signs of fatigue, examples being quick breathing and sloppy strikes. Naruto created another clone to go around the side to attack Zabuza with a lightning jutsu. The clone made it to the other side and went through the hand signs Boar → Ram → Snake → Horse → Dragon and thought " _ **Lightning Release: Electromagnetic Murder**_." Lightning rushed from the clone's hands and arced from the ground into Zabuza's side. Zabuza barely dodged the lightning by jumping backwards. Kakashi and the clone rushed to the opposite sides of Zabuza to try a combo.

Kakashi went for an axe kick and Naruto went for Zabuza's legs. Zabuza tried to move but couldn't in time. Kakashi's foot hit him in the forehead and Naruto's foot impacted the back of Zabuza's shins. Zabuza quickly recovered and jumped out onto the water and landed in a three-point landing. Kakashi rushed him and fell into Zabuza's trap, when Kakashi got to Zabuza, the rogue-nin raised his hand and Kakashi was surrounded by a sphere of water.

Naruto inwardly cursed and jumped back to his teammates to converse to come up with a plan. Zabuza saw the three Genin converse and made 5 water clones when they turned to him. Sasuke pulled out a fuma shuriken and threw it towards Zabuza, missing the clones and almost hitting the real Zabuza. At the last second, Zabuza rotated his body in a clockwise manner to dodge the shuriken. He turned to face the Genin but realized it was a bad idea because the Naruto with his teammates poofed into smoke, and the shuriken that was thrown turned into Naruto. When the shuriken turned into Naruto, Naruto was holding 8 kunai, one in each gap between the fingers. The blonde threw the kunai at Zabuza and Zabuza cursed in his mind and released the water he had Kakashi in.

Kakashi smiled at the work of his Genin and turned to Zabuza who began going through hand signs and Kakashi copied him. After about forty hand signs, they both thought " _ **Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Jutsu**_ ," and one dragon came up from the water from each shinobi and coiled around one another before rushing the other. Kakashi dodged Zabuza's but Zabuza wasn't as lucky. Zabuza tried going through hand signs again but Kakashi copied again and Kakashi finished first and thought, " _ **Water Release: Great Waterfall Jutsu**_ ," and a tsunami rushed Zabuza.

The water picked up Zabuza and slammed the man into a tree. Zabuza at the moment was very tired, and couldn't register two senbon hit him in the neck. Kakashi went to go check the downed man and checked his pulse just in time to see a Kiri hunter-nin.

"I thank you for weakening him Konoha shinobi-san, I have been chasing him for a long time." The hunter-nin told Kakashi.

"No problem." Kakashi responded.

"Well I will take him to dispose of the body." The hunter-nin stated.

Naruto suddenly came out of nowhere and kicked the hunter-nin in the face. "You fake! Hunter-nin are supposed to dispose of the body on the spot."

The hunter-nin grabbed Zabuza's body quickly and vanished in a mist Shunshin. Sakura was about to go off on Naruto but Kakashi stopped her.

"Good deduction skills Naruto, at least we now know Zabuza has another friend." Kakashi told Naruto.

"What do you mean sensei?" Sakura asked in a confused tone.

"Exactly what Naruto told the hunter-nin, they are supposed to deal with the body right on the spot, not take it away before doing anything." Kakashi told his pink-haired student who nodded, "Well it appears I have used too much energy, one of you please carry me."

Naruto was right there as Kakashi was about to hit the ground. He put Kakashi's arm over his shoulder and picked him up, "Well Tazuna-san, can you take us to your home?"

Tazuna was just standing there with his mouth wide open, flabbergasted at the ability of shinobi and shot up when Naruto addressed him, "Of course, follow me."

The rest of team 7 was led to Tazuna's home and when they entered Naruto laid Kakashi against the wall. He turned around when he heard a female exclaim, "Father!"

"Tsunami-chan." He replied as he embraced her, "This is the team that escorted me home." He said as he motioned to the three awake Genin.

Tsunami was a very pretty good looking female, she has long blue-colored hair. She wears a short-sleeved pink shirt with the end of the sleeves and the collar being red in color. She also wears a long blue skirt to complete the look.

"Thank you guys." Tsunami bowed as she addressed the Genin.

"You're welcome Tsunami-san, but is there anywhere we can place our sensei, he passed out after a big battle." Naruto replied than asked.

"Of course, follow me." Tsunami responded.

Tsunami led Naruto and team 7 to a room with a mattress of which Naruto laid Kakashi on.

"Thank you Tsunami-san." Naruto thanked the woman with Sasuke and Sakura nodding.

"It's the least I can do, you did protect my father after all." Tsunami dismissed them.

Naruto and the rest of team 7 smiled until they heard someone enter the room.

"Inari, I'm back." Tazuna told his grandson.

"Hello Ji-san!" Inari responded with a hug.

"These are the amazing shinobi that protected me on my way home." Tazuna told Inari.

"Why does it matter what they can do, they are just going to die." Inari darkly replied.

"Why do you say that?" Sasuke asked the boy.

"No one can stand up to Gato, you might as well go back home." Inari replied to Sasuke.

Naruto spoke up, "No can do, we have a mission to protect your grandfather. I don't care if I die, which I won't because it is too early to give up on my dream to become Hokage."

Inari's eyes widened before he got angry again, "You guys are weak, just leave!" Inari then stormed away.

"Sorry about that, he has been like that ever since his step-father died." Tsunami told team 7.

"Don't worry, it's okay." Naruto told the woman.

They heard a rustle of bed sheets and turned to see an awake Kakashi.

"Welcome back sensei." Team 7 told their sensei.

Kakashi made an eye-smile, "Good to be back, I guess." He then got serious, "We have to prepare for Zabuza again, and he will be back. In the meantime, I will teach you guys some more things before then."

Sakura perked up, "What will you teach us?"

"Water Walking, a more difficult chakra exercise. Follow me." Kakashi got up from his mattress and grabbed the crutches near the mattress.

Kakashi led team 7 to a body of water to begin their exercise on. Knowing that his students would ask how to do it, so he put his hands in the ram hand sign and began to walk over the surface of the water. About a meter out, Kakashi began to instruct his students.

"To do this, you need to constantly channel chakra to your feet and adjust to match the water. The water is always flowing, and so should your chakra." Kakashi instructed.

Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura looked to one another and nodded before channeling chakra to their feet and they walked to the water. All three of them got a couple inches out, but Sasuke began to sink as Naruto and Sakura remained. Naruto stopped the sinking of Sasuke by pulling him up so Sasuke could catch himself. They all continued walking out to where Kakashi stood.

"Good job you three, especially you Naruto for being able to stand on the water while pulling up Sasuke. Now I want you three to work on doing this instinctually." Kakashi told his students.

"Hai!" Team 7 shouted.

For the entire day, team 7 trained in water walking while Kakashi watched over the bridge. Naruto could stay on the water pretty well, while the other two would fall after a while. Naruto even decided to show off and also performed the leaf exercise. But everything went this way the entire week.

One of the only major events was Naruto turning Inari hopeful again despite not knowing. Naruto got to talking with Inari and helped him see the light again, and everyone noticed the huge change in Inari. Another big thing that happened was that Naruto met the hunter-nin, and Naruto knew this person was it, but the hunter-nin themselves didn't know Naruto knew.

-Flashback-

 _Naruto was in a clearing training with his shadow clones. He was getting to be actually exhausted, and could feel sleep approaching him. The blonde dropped when his last clone dispelled. When he leaned against a tree, his vision turned to black. When his vision did come back, he saw a sewer, or that was what he thought it was. He saw two pipes lining the top corners of the ceiling. He could see a distinct glow from each, the right was a deep blue, and the other was a crimson. He followed the pipes to a room that had a large gate with a paper in the center with the kanji for 'seal'._

 _He stared for about a minute before he saw two red eyes begin to emanate around the room. The eyes had slitted pupils and Naruto could feel the malice coming from them._

" _Kyubi?" Naruto asked._

" _ **Yes, I am the Kyubi, yet you do not tremble in fear. Why is that**_ _?" the Kyubi asked._

" _I do not fear you because you are locked away. Doomed to be stuck in my gut." Naruto responded with a straight face._

 _The Kyubi growled, "_ _ **You naïve boy! I will get out, I promise you!**_ _"_

 _Naruto gained a sad face, "I am sorry for your imprisonment Kyubi, I am, but we are both victims here. Neither of us wanting the sealing to happen."_

 _They Kyubi seemed to be surprised, "_ _ **Why do you care**_ _?"_

" _Because you were dealt a bad hand in life, as was I. I feel as if we should stick together to at least make your stay pleasant." Naruto replied._

 _Kyubi scoffed, "_ _ **Whatever**_ _,_ _ **just leave.**_ _"_

 _Naruto nodded and faded from his mindscape. When he came too, he felt someone reaching for him and grabbed their hand before he opened his eyes to look them in the eyes._

" _Who are you?" Naruto asked the mysterious person._

 _The person wore their long hair loosely, and wore a pink, sleeveless kimono, with pale red edges and decorated with small plum-colored swirls that went to their ankles._

" _Isn't it rude to ask a name before stating your own?" The person asked._

" _Pardon me, my name is Uzumaki Naruto." Naruto responded._

" _My name is Haku, and before you ask, I am a boy." Haku stated._

" _Doubt it." Naruto responded._

" _Excuse me?" Haku asked._

" _I doubt you're a boy, chakra reacts specifically to a gender, and I can feel you're a girl. Besides that, you are wearing an abundance of pink and you're facial structure favors that of a female's." Naruto responded._

" _Seeing as how you deduced correctly, I say I am a boy so people don't underestimate me." Haku told Naruto._

" _Well, nice meeting you Haku-chan, but I must go. Tell Zabuza I said hi. Ja ne." Naruto stated with a laugh before vanishing._

 _Haku stood there, shocked that this boy just found out she was the hunter-nin. But she knocked herself out of it so she could grab the herbs she needed quickly and get to Zabuza to report this._

-Flashback end-

Naruto was told to stay at the house to protect Tazuna's family and happily agreed. Naruto was sitting on the ground and was snapped out of his thoughts when he felt two presences appear. He rushed to see who they were and saw they were Gato's mercenaries. He jumped from the tree he was in and landed in front of the mercenaries with his hood over his head and his facemask over his face. The mercenaries were honestly a bit freaked out by the boy, and raised their katanas when Naruto ran towards them with his arms behind him. They tried to slice him but he jumped over them and kicked one on the back of the neck and jumped on top of the other and locked his feet around their neck and threw them into a tree, knocking them out.

He made a shadow clone to stay at the house as he went to the bridge to back up his team. He arrived at the bridge to see a dome of ice panels with Sasuke in the middle and senbon sticking out of the Uchiha. He looked around some more to see Sakura with Tazuna and Kakashi fighting Zabuza. He put his hands in the tiger seal and breathed in a great amount of air before thinking, " _ **Fire Release: Great Fireball Jutsu**_." Naruto shot a huge fireball from his mouth and saw the fire had no effect of the ice so he jumped into the dome.

"What…are you…doing?" Sasuke asked between deep breathes.

"Helping you. What does it look like?" Naruto responded with a smile before turning to an ice panel that had the hunter-nin, "Nice to see you again Haku-chan." He told Haku with a smile.

"I'm sorry about this Naruto-san, but I have to do this for Zabuza-sama." Haku stated as she raised her hands that had senbon between each finger before throwing the senbon.

"I understand Haku," He began as he dodged the senbon, "the pain of being alone and finding someone to care for you. But you must understand, Zabuza doesn't care for you anymore that he would a tool."

"I know, but he saved me, it is my duty to be his tool." Haku responded.

"Then I'm sorry too Haku." Naruto said with closed eyes.

Haku's image spread to multiple mirrors and each Haku held senbon between their fingers. At the same time, each Haku threw their senbon at the two boys. In the beginning both of them were both okay, but when Haku spread to more and more mirrors, it got more difficult to dodge the senbon. When Haku was in each mirror and they all threw their senbon, Sasuke moved to intercept the senbon going for Naruto. Naruto sadly couldn't move in time and he closed his eyes, ready for the pain, only for it to never arrive. He opened his eyes to see Sasuke covering him with his (Sasuke's) arms outwards. All the senbon basically covered Sasuke's back, and Naruto couldn't move to catch Sasuke as Sasuke landed on the senbon, pushing them further in.

"Sasuke!" Naruto shouted with tears coming from his eyes.

Naruto went to Sasuke and raised him up to lay his head on his leg to support him.

"Looks like I saved you Naruto." Sasuke muttered out, Naruto barely hearing it.

Sasuke's eyes began to shut as Naruto shouted out, "Stay with me Sasuke!"

At this point, Naruto couldn't stop crying, tears were marking his face as he was hurting over the pain of his brother of all but blood.

"Naruto, listen to me." Sasuke whispered, "Take my power, and achieve both our dreams. Remember the story of Indra and Asura?" Sasuke asked.

"Yes, of course I do." Naruto responded between sniffles.

"I know that I am Indra's reincarnation, and you Asura's. If you take my spirit, you will have both halves." Sasuke paused to catch his breath, "I trust you with my life, which is why I must do this." Sasuke raised his left hand to Naruto's head.

Sasuke's hand began to glow blue, and a white energy began to pass from Sasuke to Naruto. If you looked closely, you could see the shape of a body in the white energy.

-Flashback-

" _Hey Naruto, I want to read up on something, you can work on anything you'd like." Sasuke stated._

 _Sasuke went to the library to read on a subject he has read on for a long time. The subject was the transference of an Uchiha's power. Sasuke wanted to know if he died before Naruto that he could leave something behind for his new brother. The ability he was trying to learn was called, "_ _ **Transference of the Uchiha**_ _." It was an ability created long ago that when used, would pass on the power of the Uchiha user to the target. It was created by an Uchiha long ago that bypassed the Curse of Hatred. That Uchiha was on his death bed with his friend right next to him. Before this however, they wrote a scroll that was locked away. And while the Uchiha was dying, they passed their power to their best friend, which allowed the friend to use the Sharingan's final form, the Mangekyou. Usually the Mangekyou was achieved through watching your friend die and feeling responsible for it._

 _Sasuke found this scroll one night and read it and was surprised to find what was in the scroll. He then thought of himself and Naruto in that position and decided to read the scroll just in case that did happen._

-Flashback end-

Naruto felt his eyes burn, and his body as well. What was happening now was since Sasuke was the reincarnation of Indra, and therefore had large chakra reserves, the soul of Indra was passed onto Naruto making his reserves grow even further. His eyes were burning because the Sharingan Kekkei Genkai was engraving itself into Naruto's DNA and his eyes were accommodating the change.

Naruto began to cry and it wasn't because of the physical pain, but the mental pain. He just lost his brother in all but blood. He may not be Sasuke's blood brother like Itachi was, but he felt like he was. This connection was partly due to them also being reincarnations of Asura and Indra who were brothers. Naruto could feel Sasuke's life force energy depleting.

"Sasuke!" Naruto cried once more as he held Sasuke's head in his left hand and Sasuke's left hand in his right.

Naruto's eyes shifted from his bright blue to a deep red. Two tomoe grew in each eye, circling his pupil. His whisker marks deepened as his pupil shifted from a normal pupil to a small diamond. Red Chakra began to circle Naruto as his teeth sharpened. His hair going from his sunny blonde to the same blonde with black roots and his eyebrows turning black completely. The black hair was a result from Sasuke's chakra imprinting on his own and combining and the DNA was carried with it, altering Naruto's own.

"Haku! Are you proud now!?" Naruto shouted, "You have taken what I called a brother! And you will pay!"

Naruto charged the singular mirror that Haku was sitting in as she watched the scene with tears in her eyes, but her eyes were hidden behind the mask. Naruto's fist impacted the mirror before Haku could move and Haku was punched out of the dome and her mask shattered from the punch. Haku raised her hand as Naruto appeared in front of her with his fist raised. He was shaking with rage, but couldn't do anything as he held himself back.

Naruto punched the ground, "Damn it all! I'm sorry Sasuke."

The red chakra shroud dispersed as Naruto kneeled on the ground. Naruto's natural spirit still held out over Sasuke's and Indra's, and the Curse of Hatred that followed. The ideals of Naruto and Asura contained Indra's hatred. Naruto continued punching the ground to the point of his hands bleeding.

Haku approached Naruto with her tears now visible, "I'm so sorry Naruto-kun."

Naruto made no visible response and just sat where he was and continued to mourn Sasuke's passing. Haku continued to cry until she heard the chirping of a thousand birds and looked to Zabuza. Zabuza had tons of dogs biting down on him and Kakashi was gripping his wrist with lightning surrounding his palm.

When Kakashi made to move to stab Zabuza, Haku appeared before Zabuza and took the lightning blade to the heart. Haku spit out blood, but nonetheless smiled.

" _I have fulfilled my purpose._ " Haku thought.

Kakashi however was surprised at this, thinking back to a painful memory, back to when this exact thing happened with his own teammate.

"Girl finally did her job right." Zabuza snarled.

Zabuza felt a feeling of dread wash over him, and he couldn't react in time to notice a fist found its way into his face.

Naruto pulled back his fist, "How could you say that!? She cared about you and you just threw her away like trash!"

"You have no idea what you're talking about kid." Zabuza responded rather heatedly.

"I know as much as I should. She gave her life for you because you saved her from the curse of loneliness! Even monsters can care for people." Naruto responded.

Zabuza seemed to being taken back by this, Zabuza didn't know what to say at all.

Kakashi laid his hand upon his students shoulder. "It's okay Naruto."

Clapping could be heard on the other side of the bridge, "Even the great demon of the mist couldn't finish the job. More like a baby demon." The voice laughed.

Zabuza turned to the voice, " _Gato? What is he doing here?_ "

"I see your boy died, I'm glad he did, he deserved it." Gato continued on.

Something in Zabuza snapped, "Kid, you got a kunai?" He asked Naruto as he pulled down his bandages with the last of his arm's energy.

Naruto nodded to Zabuza's question, "Why?"

"Throw me one." Zabuza told Naruto who nodded and threw him one.

Zabuza caught the knife in his mouth and ran towards the group of mercenaries, slicing everyone down, sparing no one. After Zabuza killed most of them, he appeared in front of Gato.

"I'm tired of your arrogance, Gato." Zabuza stated with a snarl. "I am going to kill you."

Zabuza gained some momentum to decapitate Gato and after he did, Gato's head hit the ground and many blades were stabbed into Zabuza's body. Zabuza finished off the rest of the mercenaries and fell to the floor.

Naruto ran to Zabuza, "Zabuza!"

Zabuza smiled to Naruto, "Please bring me Haku."

Naruto nodded and picked up Haku's body carefully and moved her to Zabuza's side.

Zabuza began to cry lightly, as he looked at Haku, "I'm sorry Haku." He whispered.

Naruto's eyes began to leak tears once more for the day as he looked at the scene before him. " _I will someday stop the cycle of death. I swear, Sasuke. I will avenge your family as well._ " Naruto thought.

Zabuza said his goodbyes to Haku as the light in his eyes began to fade away, "Naruto, please, take by blade, I sealed in it all I own and I want you to keep it as my gratitude to you."

"Okay Zabuza, I will honor your last wish." Naruto nodded, " _I swear I will not let your death go in vain, Zabuza, Haku_."

Zabuza smiled, "Thank you…Naruto." He whispered as his final words.

Naruto kneeled next to the dead pair, tears falling from his eyes. "Come on Naruto, we'll find a place to bury them." Kakashi told his somber student.

Kakashi wished his student didn't have to experience this so early. The death of an ally, just so much death in general. But it did come with the job description.

Naruto nodded and rose up and he picked up Haku as Kakashi picked up Zabuza. Naruto and Kakashi took the bodies to a cliff that overlooked Wave. They placed Haku and Zabuza down so they could dig their graves so they could give them a proper farewell away from the bloodshed.

Naruto went back down to the bridge to recover Zabuza's blade and to grab Sasuke's body. He couldn't even touch Sasuke though, the closer he got to him, the more he began to cry. Kakashi came up to him and rubbed his back.

"I got Sasuke, Naruto." Kakashi told Naruto while inwardly thinking, " _I'm sorry Obito, I've let you down._ "

Naruto nodded and grabbed the Kubikiribōchō and walked back to Tazuna's house. Nobody would see the real him until they left to go back to Konoha. By real him, I mean that he sent clones to go help with the bridge.

The entire time Naruto was in his room, he was meditating to sort his feelings. He didn't know what to feel anymore, but to help himself, he thought of what he had left. Kakashi, the Hokage, his friends. He knew he lost Sasuke, but he knows that Sasuke wouldn't want him to be depressed.

The remnants of Team 7 were heading to the bridge to head back to Konoha. Naruto came down from his room with a small smile before they left to the bridge. Kakashi was proud of how Naruto dealt with this ordeal.

"Naruto-nii!" Inari shouted.

"Yes Inari-kun?" Naruto responded.

"Please come back some day." Inari requested, getting a nod from Naruto.

"I'll come down if I can." Naruto replied.

"Thanks Naruto-nii." Inari responded.

Naruto nodded as he and his team left to return home. When they were on the bridge, Tazuna asked, "What shall we name the bridge?"

Tsunami answered, "How about the Great Naruto Bridge?"

"That sounds great, after all, Naruto did have a big part of freeing our country." Tazuna replied.

Team 7 made it back to Konoha and they reported to their Kage.

"I'm sorry about your experience, Naruto-kun, Sakura." Hiruzen told the two Genin. "It is up to you if you want to continue being shinobi."

Sakura responded first, "I couldn't handle this a second time, I don't want to do this anymore." Sakura said with tears threatening to fall.

Hiruzen nodded, "I understand, and you Naruto?"

"I can't quit, I must continue to strive to be the Hokage and to complete Sasuke's dream as well." Naruto responded with no doubt in his voice.

Sakura looked to her ex-teammate, "I envy you Naruto, to be able to walk away from this and still remain strong."

Naruto nodded to his teammate before Hiruzen spoke, "You two are dismissed, I must talk with Kakashi."

Naruto and Sakura left the room, and Kakashi remained, "What did you need me for Hokage-sama?"

"It appears Naruto is you remaining student." Hiruzen sadly stated, "Do you wish to still be his sensei?"

"Yes Hokage-sama." Kakashi nodded, "And I have one more thing to say about the mission."

"What is it Kakashi?" Hiruzen asked.

"Sasuke used a jutsu that transferred his soul to Naruto, and his DNA passed to Naruto as well. And Naruto now has the Sharingan, so he is now an Uchiha." Kakashi told the old Kage whose eyes widened.

"I must say, I'm surprised Sasuke knew such a jutsu. And even more that Naruto is now an Uchiha." Hiruzen responded, "I'm getting too old for this."

Konoha had a large funeral for Sasuke and it was a cremation in honor of the Uchiha. The Uchiha were known to be as painful as fire, but also as lively ever since Konoha was founded. Naruto stayed in the Uchiha compound and spent most of his time learning things, not wasting a single minute except for eating and sleeping. Kakashi continued teaching him as well, and Naruto was happy about that.

 **So there is Chapter 3, quite a…emotional…chapter. I hope you enjoy and reviews are appreciated for constructive criticism.**


	5. Chapter 4

**Here is Chapter 4, I hope you enjoy and leave a review.**

Naruto and Kakashi did many missions together for about 3 months, totaling up to about 20 C-Rank, and 10 B-rank. Kakashi also taught Naruto a lot considering he was his only student now. Right now, Naruto was waiting for Kakashi in training ground 7. When he did arrive, Kakashi was holding a slip of paper.

"Good morning Naruto, I brought with me a recommendation for the Chunin Exams." Kakashi greeted with an eye-smile.

"Don't the exams require three people?" Naruto said, instantly gaining a faraway look in his eyes.

"Yes, but you are going to receive two genin from reservation. The exams aren't for quite a bit, so you can get used to your temporary team." Kakashi replied, "I know you don't want another team, but this is one of the only ways to get promoted."

Naruto nodded, "I know, and you said I only have to be with them for the Exams?" He asked.

Kakashi nodded in return, "Yes."

"Okay, just for this exam then." Naruto stated.

"Good, your team is waiting at training ground 14." Kakashi told his remaining student.

Naruto nodded, and grabbed the Kubikiribōchō he laid on the ground and secured it on his back. Over the last three months, he has been using the scrolls in the seals on the sword to his benefit as well. After he secured the sword, he put his hands in his pockets and walked to training ground 14 slowly. When he arrived, he saw a male and a female.

The male had short, spiky black hair, he wore a black jacket and black ANBU style pants with blue shinobi sandals and wore his headband on his forehead. He had black eyes, and appeared to be about 15. The female had dark brown hair that reached the small of her back and was tied in a ponytail. She wore a black haori with blue pants and blue sandals as well, and her headband was around her neck. She had blue green eyes and also appeared to be 15.

The two of them were surprised by Naruto's appearance especially with the large sword on his back. Naruto was wearing his shirt that was similar to Iwa's with one sleeve and it was black. He wore Black ANBU style pants with the matching black ANBU boots. Over the month, he had his headband's cloth changed to orange and he wore it around his waist.

Naruto waved dismissively towards his temporary teammates and greeted them. "Sup, names Naruto."

Both of the mentioned people sweatdropped before looking to one another. "S-sup Naruto, my name is Hime, and this is Reo." The female introduced.

"Nice to meet you, let's get to training." Naruto stated, with an unnoticed smirk. They were going to find the "training" as hell.

"Ok, sounds good." Reo replied.

"Let's go princess," Naruto called to Hime jokingly to the center of the training ground.

Naruto pulled out his sword and lodged it into the ground. He motioned for the two of them to charge him, to which they did…and got owned. Naruto absolutely owned them, as he was faster, stronger, and smarter, granted the intelligence was partly from Sasuke.

Reo charged first and threw out his right fist to Naruto's chest, and Naruto leaned to the left and Reo's fist flew right by Naruto. When Reo was right in front of Naruto, said blonde's knee shot up into the teenager's stomach. Hime jumped forward to assist Reo but she didn't fare any better. She tried to kick Naruto from above but Naruto let her sail right by him. Reo was kicked away by Naruto who just jumped to achieve a spinning kick to Hime's back. (You should know this already, but just saying, Naruto owned them because he got one-on-one training from Kakashi, one of the strongest Jonin in the village, for about 3 months)

"Your Taijutsu is pretty sound, I should be able to teach you a few things." Naruto told the two.

"I thought…we were…teammates, not you…being the sensei." Reo pointed out between breathes, "And you…kick hard."

"We are teammates, but I want to make sure you are able to do some good and we get used to each other. I gave some pointers to my last teammates too." Naruto retorted then stated with a faraway look in his eye. (Naruto will most of the time drift away when thinking of the old team 7)

Hime thought of his reasoning and nodded, "You…actually…are right." She breathed out.

"I know I am, so get up so we can get to training." Naruto told them.

For the month until the Exams, Naruto gave some pointers to his newbie Genin teammates. As they were, they wouldn't have lasted long.

The makeshift team 7 was now heading to the academy to initiate the first portion of the exams. They entered said building to see a bunch of people crowded around a room, Naruto could clearly see it was a genjutsu. He could feel the Sasuke part of him point out the obvious genjutsu but didn't follow the nudge. Naruto and his team went up to the actual third level and entered the room. When they entered they were attacked by killing intent. While Naruto barely sweated, his teammates were scared out of their mind. He looked to his teammates and instilled some confidence in them.

"Come on guys, let's find somewhere to sit." Naruto told his teammates.

His teammates nodded and followed him to a wall to which they sat down at. As he sat, Naruto saw many of his classmates, and was surprised by Ino's reaction to him, most likely anger for getting her Sasuke-kun killed. When she looked at him, there was anger in her eyes…but also sadness. She knew he was tortured by that event every night.

Eventually, a teenager with grey hair and glasses approached Naruto, "Hello, I hope you notice that everyone is staring at you." They said.

Naruto raised his brow at this boy and retorted, "I hope you notice that I don't care. They can stare all they want." He paused, "Is that all you came over here for?"

"Actually," the boy chuckled and pushed up his glasses, "no, I wanted to see if you wanted some info on the competition."

Naruto shook his head, "Don't get me wrong…" He waited for the boy to give his name.

The boy blushed, "Oh, right, my name is Kabuto Yakushi."

"Well, Kabuto, I don't trust you. You have a smell of snakes about you. And if I'm not mistaken, the only people who are associated with snakes are, one, a traitor, and two, someone who nobody really messes with. So either way is not looking well for you." Naruto stated.

Naruto noticed the drop of sweat that slid down Kabuto's face, "I can assure you I don't associate with either person."

"I doubt it, so what did you want to help me with?" Naruto retorted then asked.

"Right, I have collected some info cards over the years and if you want, I can show you stats of certain shinobi." Kabuto replied.

"Fine, give me info on Gaara of the Sand." Naruto asked, both his teammates giving him a surprised look.

-Flashback-

Naruto, Reo, and Hime were leaving the training grounds and were about to go their own ways until they heard a shout. All three went to the sound and saw a teenager in a black suit with paint on his face holding up child in a blue scarf. There was also a girl behind him holding a battle fan while looking irritated at the teen in the black suit.

"Damn it Kankuro, let the boy go _."_ The girl told the male teen.

"Hold on Temari let me teach this squirt some lessons." The now dubbed Kankuro replied.

"If you get caught then I'm not helping you." Temari told the boy.

"Don't worry, it won't take long." Kankuro said as he pulled back his fist and was about to punch the young boy.

The fist was an inch away from the boy's face when a hand caught the fist. "I don't think it's wise to hit the Hokage's grandson, do you?"

Kankuro turned to the voice to see a blonde and black-haired teen. "Who are you?"

"It's rude to ask one's name before giving your own, but seeing as how you steal your friend's makeup, I didn't see you having manners anyways. Names Naruto, the next Hokage. And the boy you're holding is Konohamaru Sarutobi, grandson of the current Hokage." Naruto replied, his ice-blue eyes boring into Kankuro's black.

Kankuro tensed the first time Naruto said the boy was the Hokage's grandson, but it shifted to anger when Naruto called his face-paint makeup. "It's face-paint!"

"Yeah, if you say so." Naruto chuckled as he squeezed Kankuro's hand making the Suna-nin to drop Konohamaru and pull back.

Kankuro grunted at the sudden pain in his hand, "You twerp!"

Kankuro tried to punch Naruto but it didn't work as Naruto shifted to the right past the left hook. After Kankuro was far enough, Naruto did what he did to Reo and planted his knee into Kankuro's stomach, making him kneel. "Puppeteers often don't use Taijutsu, right?" Naruto paused, "You should leave before your red-head teammate gets angry."

Kankuro paled at that, as did Temari, as they both looked to a tree that had their teammate in its branches.

Sand gathered at the boys feet and said boy floated to the floor. "Kankuro, you're a disappointment to our village." The boy looked to Naruto, "Gaara. What are you called?"

Naruto understood the weird grammar and replied, "Naruto."

"I look forward to see you in the exams, Naruto." Gaara said and turned to his teammates and said, "Let's go."

All three Suna-nin vanished in a swirl of sand and Naruto looked to his own teammates.

-Flashback end-

"Easy enough," Kabuto replied, pulling out a card and channeled chakra to said card.

On the card held a picture of Gaara and some words along with a graph displaying his skills.

Naruto grabbed the card and carefully took in the information, " _Higher than average Ninjutsu, Taijutsu unknown, Genjutsu known to be non-existent. Said to have come back from every mission unharmed._ " Naruto thought.

Naruto handed the card back, "Thanks, now can you leave, I have to speak with my team."

Kabuto nodded, and turned around to leave only to be assaulted by some shinobi from an unknown village. Their headbands bearing music notes, so Naruto could deduce they were from a recently formed village. One of the shinobi that resembled a mummy threw a punch towards Kabuto and the teen managed to dodge, but Kabuto's glasses shattered and he kneeled while throwing up his lunch.

Hime looked about to go help Kabuto, but Naruto interrupted her with an arm in her path. "Don't help him or trust him, I have a bad vibe from him."

Both Hime and Reo nodded at Naruto's orders, and they may be older, but Naruto has more skill.

A large 'boom' erupted in front of a door, and the sound echoed around the room as someone stood in the smoke, "Get to your seats!" A voice shouted.

The smoke cleared to show a man clad in all black with a bandana of black as well. You could tell this man has seen some things because there were two scars that stretched across his face.

"My name is Ibiki Morino! And I'm going to be your proctor for the first exam." The man in black said.

Naruto sat down next Hinata Hyuga, and his teammates were scattered about the room. The blonde already knew it was an exam of information gathering, and was thinking of ways his teammates could get the answers. His thoughts were confirmed as the test paper hit his desk, he saw the questions were way too hard for a normal Genin, or even Chunin. Naruto turned discretely looked to his teammates and nodded to them.

Naruto closed his eyes as the test started, and when it did he channeled chakra to his eyes, changing them from the original blue to a blood red with two tomoe. The person in front of him began writing and so did he. When Naruto finished writing the answers, he made a seal-less Shadow Clone that appeared as a fly. The fly flew to his teammates and proceeded to relay the answers.

When his Shadow Clones dispersed, Naruto laid his head down to pass the time. When he laid his head on his hands, he went into his mindscape to have a conversation with the Kyubi. He met the Kyubi after the bridge incident as he was meditating after the Hokage recommended it.

" **What are you doing here boy**?" The Kyubi asked.

Naruto shrugged, "I dunno, I just felt we don't spend enough time together and I know it gets lonely in here."

" **You naïve boy, I don't even have a conscious, how can I feel lonely**?" Kyubi asked.

"You do too have a conscious, I can feel it. If you didn't have a conscious, how do you get angry?" Naruto retorted to the giant fox.

Kyubi growled, " _ **Damn boy**_." The Kyubi thought, " **Fine, I do have a conscious, but I am not lonely. I prefer solitude anyways.** "

"You do know the mind connection goes both ways right?" Naruto asked, getting a face-paw from Kyubi, Naruto laughed, "I know you feel alone, just like I did."

The Kyubi scoffed, " **You have no idea how I feel, I am sure you haven't spent a good decade stuck in someone's gut**."

"You're right, I don't. But I do know how it feels for people to hate you just because of what they think just because of rumors." Naruto retorted.

The Kyubi seemed to look thoughtful, " **You are different than all the humans I've seen. In the future, maybe you will be able to harness my power better than my two previous hosts.** "

"I am known to be different, I can take more pain than most and come out sane." Naruto replied. "By the way, who are your previous hosts?"

" **Mito and Kushina Uzumaki**." The Kyubi replied, " **Before you ask, no, I do not know whether you are directly related to those two.** "

Naruto seemed to sadden, "That's fine, another question." The Kyubi "hm'd" and Naruto asked his question, "Is Kyubi your real name?"

" **No, but I won't tell you until the end of your training in my abilities.** " Kyubi replied.

"Fair enough." Naruto responded with a nod. "Looks like Ibiki is about to ask the tenth question. Better go."

Naruto woke up to hear Ibiki say something about answering wrong and never being able to take the test again. Due to this, he sent two disguised Shadow Clones to his teammates to ensure they stay. After about ten minutes of people leaving, almost fourteen teams remained out of the original forty. With fourteen teams came about forty-two individuals.

Ibiki spoke up again, "For those who remain," He paused for dramatic effect, "you pass." Getting face-faults around the room except from Naruto.

Naruto decided to respond, "The meaning was easy to guess, you work in the torture department and specialize in making people talk. All I had to do was just sit back and relax and let it unroll."

"You are exactly right Naruto-san," Ibiki nodded, "I have had my fair share of torture and I now specialize in it." Ibiki pulled off his bandana to show a multitude of scars.

"That is gnarly man," Naruto told Ibiki, "That must have hurt like a butt cheek on a stick." Naruto said getting chuckles from a small amount of people.

"Yes it did, but I held out for my village just like you all should." Ibiki replied.

Naruto sensed something coming from the window and covered his face from flying glass blown away by a projectile. The said projectile unrolled itself to show a lady that wore clothes that left little to the imagination.

"My name is Anko Mitarashi and I will be your proctor for the second exam, now follow me to training ground forty-four!" Anko shouted while jumping back out the window.

Naruto first wrote something on a piece of paper and threw it to Ibiki who caught it between his index and middle finger, and before Naruto saw his reaction, he motioned for his teammates to follow him as he jumped out the window too. Reo caught up to the blonde and questioned him.

"Training ground forty-four is known as the Forest of Death, we'll die for sure." Reo told Naruto, with Hime following with a similar expression to Reo.

"I'm aware, but I've trained there before with Anko. Kakashi-sensei introduced me to her quite a bit ago." Naruto replied with a shrug and his hands in his pockets.

"Wh-What?" Reo asked with astonishment.

"You heard me, this training ground isn't new to me." Naruto replied. "We'll be fine, just stick close to me."

Naruto and the makeshift team 7 made it to the forest of death and approached Anko.

"Welcome guys, you got here fast." Anko stated rather quickly, "Hey Naru-kun."

"Hey Anko-chan." Naruto replied.

"I guess we'll wait for the others." Anko stated again.

Naruto nodded and the four people waited for a while, and Naruto felt a presence that he has constantly felt for his whole life. It was beginning to worry him, because the more he feels it the more it feels like his own chakra, but more grown and expanded. He could never find where it originates as it disappears the second he looks.

After about ten minutes, everyone made it to the forest and Anko began her explanation, "This is the Forest of Death," She heard a chorus of gasps, "Ah shut up you pansies." She told the ones who gasped, "You will start with one scroll and will fight others to get a second scroll unlike your first. The faster you get the scroll and get to the center the better."

Anko saw Naruto looking elsewhere and decided to throw a kunai at him and quickly discovered it was a bad idea, especially after she appeared behind him. When Anko threw the kunai, Naruto closed his eyes and caught it, positioning it to where it was to Anko's neck. He turned to look at her and she saw his Sharingan spinning.

"You'd do well to remember that I can't be surprised." Naruto told the purple-haired Jonin.

"Noted." Anko responded with a sweatdrop.

Anko got back to her position mumbling about troublesome blondes, and turned to the crowd once more, "Now I need you to sign a contract and receive your scrolls."

Some random Suna Genin asked, "Why do we have to sign a contract?"

Anko responded with a devilish smirk, "Because you could possibly die and Konoha won't be held responsible."

The Genin began sweating, and some left outright, and only eleven teams remained.

"Great, now we are at an odd number. Oh well, that just means it will be cut down even more." Anko stated, "Well come get signed up then."

After everyone signed the contract and received a scroll, they lined up at specific gates. Naruto was at his and was pondering a chakra signature he felt, it felt very…snake-y. Almost like it resembled a snake slithering through the woods, and the reserves were higher than most Jonin, even matching old man Hokage. The buzzer rang through the air and the gates opened, allowing the teams to run into the forest.

Within about ten minutes, one team could be heard screaming, most likely caused by the animals eating their late lunch. Naruto led his team into the trees and created two clones that henged into a piece of cloth that rested in the pockets of his teammates. Naruto and his team were jumping through the trees before Naruto was blasted away by a strong gust of wind, probably caused by a wind jutsu. The wind carried Naruto away and threw him to the floor below, luckily Naruto landed in a three point landing. He could feel his team being attacked by two presences, and the large signature from before was approaching him.

Naruto stood there until a lady walked out from the woods, staring at him.

"Okay creepy lady, time to stop the staring." Naruto told the odd lady.

A tongue slithered out of her mouth, and it was unrealistically long, I'm talking like a snake just slithered out of her mouth. "I'm sorry Naruto-kun, but you will become my new body."

"No thank you, I prefer to remain in control of my own body." Naruto responded with a shiver.

"It wasn't a request." The lady charged him and reached for Naruto's face.

Without activating his Sharingan, he dodged the hand and launched his own fist into the ladies stomach. Despite the strength behind the punch, the lady just shrugged it off and continued on her path to Naruto. Naruto jumped over the hand this time and put his hands in the tiger seal and inhaled before exhaling a giant torrent of fire as he created a clone simultaneously who had his hands in the bird seal and exhaled a large gust of wind that empowered the fire. The lady seemed surprised by the combination and merged with the ground. The fire dispersed and Naruto had to jump to the side to avoid the lady again as she tried to grab him once more. Naruto pulled his Kubikiribōchō and tried to hit the lady with the large cleaver-like blade. She seemed surprised by the blade, but didn't deter in her goals.

Naruto did a horizontal slash and she jumped over the blade, instead of swinging again, he had his hand in the half tiger seal and spit out a large bullet of water that impacted the ground. Naruto secured his blade on his back and went through the hand signs Ox → Monkey → Bird → Yang Water → Rat → Boar → Bird, and from the water sprouted a large dragon of water that flew towards the lady.

She was surprised again and this time actually got hit by the jutsu. The dragon dispersed and the lady stood up, her face seemingly falling off, white skin visible and purple markings around the eyes.

" _Wait, purple markings_? _Orochimaru_?" Naruto asked himself.

"You are impressive Naruto-kun, large reserves for your age, expected from an Uzumaki nonetheless. Now show me your Sharingan!" Orochimaru shouted and ran faster than before, forcing Naruto to activate his Sharingan.

The two tomoe Sharingan followed Orochimaru, and could slightly follow the Sannin. Naruto knew, despite being able to see him, he wouldn't be able to dodge Orochimaru. He was proved right when a fist impacted with his face, nearly knocking him out. He got back up and dodged another punch from Orochimaru and ducked under a kick as well. This fight was entirely one-sided, Naruto knew this, and he was only biding his time until someone of authority sensed this fight, or something happened to draw Orochimaru away. Naruto's thinking was cut short when Orochimaru's neck stretched beyond human capabilities and Orochimaru's teeth found their way into Naruto's neck.

A symbol not unlike that of the Sharingan formed when Orochimaru bit, but something happened that Orochimaru didn't expect. Red bubbling chakra formed around Naruto, the previously black symbol turning red. Naruto's previously normal Sharingan's pupil became a diamond, the two tomoe spinning until another tomoe appeared. Orochimaru decided to cut his losses and run, deciding the Sharingan was out of his reach for now. When Orochimaru ran, the chakra cloak receded and Naruto's teammates appeared beside the blonde.

Reo and Hime retrieved a scroll they needed which was an earth since they already had a heaven. They sensed the chakra Naruto was putting out and went to go investigate to find their teammate face in the dirt. They grabbed him and took him somewhere safe, settling for a hollowed out tree. Until Naruto awoke, they would stay there, and Hime would try to speed the progress with some basic Medical Ninjutsu.

The next day, team 7 was approached by the team from Sound. Reo and Hime almost held them off, but they were disoriented by the shinobi's sound related jutsu. The Sound shinobi almost got to Naruto, but an orange legwarmer hit the mummy-like shinobi in the face. The legwarmer led up to a smiling Lee.

"I'll defend you Naruto-kun!" Lee exclaimed, having met the blonde before and forming a rivalry with him.

Lee ran forward and repeated what he did to the mummy shinobi, except to the teammates of said mummy dude.

"Take this you green freak!" The male teammate shouted as he thrust his arms forward and Lee fell to the floor for seemingly no reason. At least it seemed that way until blood flowed from his ears.

It was at this point a deadly aura penetrated the air, nearly suffocating the Sound shinobi.

"No one hurts my friends and gets away with it." A voice growled from the hollow tree.

Everyone looked to the voice to see red flame marks covering Naruto's body, and a shroud of red chakra to encircle Naruto. It turns out the seal Orochimaru gave him allowed for him to better control foreign chakras. This stems from the bloodline of someone named Jugo, the one Orochimaru got the Juinjutsu from. You see, the man is able to absorb Natural energy at any time without drawback. And so since the Kyubi altered the seal Orochimaru gave him, it allowed for Naruto to better use the Fox's chakra, and potentially Sage Chakra.

Naruto appeared in front of the one who disorientated Lee and grabbed the man's arms and began pulling from behind for about thirty seconds until an audible 'pop' echoed across the clearing, signaling broken arms of the Sound shinobi. The Sound shinobi was then thrown away, the female teammate lost the breath in her lungs when Naruto appeared right in front of her with his fist in her gut. The girl was launched away into a tree, barreling right through it. The mummy-like shinobi got back to the fight and tapped his gauntlets and sound waves rushed towards Naruto, but he was seemingly unaffected. There was a loud crunch and a scream from the mummy shinobi.

It turns out Naruto appeared near him and brought his arm down on the mummy's own. The man was holding his arm when Naruto kicked him in the side and sent him into a tree as well.

"Thanks Lee." Naruto told a recovering Lee.

"No problem Naruto-kun!" Lee replied loudly with a thumbs up.

Naruto then grabbed his team and jumped from tree to tree to the tower in the center of the forest. He made it in record time, about an hour before the Sand team. As of right now, team 7 was resting in their rooms. As his teammates were resting, Naruto went to the Hokage to show him the seal Orochimaru gave him.

"Come in!" A voice replied to Naruto knocking on a door.

Behind said door was Hiruzen, and he was sitting back somewhat calmly.

"Hey Jiji." Naruto greeted.

"Hello Naruto-kun, do you need something?" Hiruzen responded.

"Orochimaru is here." Naruto stated rather bluntly.

Hiruzen chocked on the air in his lungs, "What!?"

"My team and I were ambushed by him, he was masquerading as a grass shinobi before." Naruto replied.

"Are you okay Naruto-kun?" Hiruzen asked, worry evident in his voice.

"Yeah, but he ended up giving me a seal." Naruto responded.

"What type of seal?" Hiruzen asked.

"I suspect a cursed seal, it allows easier access to natural energy. And in my case, easier use of the Kyubi's power." Naruto replied.

"Be careful not to use that seal excessively, we not of what it can fully do, especially if Orochimaru made it." Hiruzen stated.

Naruto nodded, "Of course. Well, that is all I wanted to say." He turned to leave, "I will be taking my leave now."

"Okay, I'll see you later Naruto-kun." Hiruzen stated with a thoughtful look, " _Looks like I'll have to have them teach Naruto-kun sooner_."

Naruto went back to his room and went straight to the bed and sat down in the lotus position. With his hands on his knees and his lungs taking in and letting out air, he entered his mindscape.

He turned to the giant fox occupying his mind, "Kyubi-san, do you know what happened with the seal?"

" **I do actually, I altered it to coexist with my seal. Instead of Orochimaru's chakra inside it, it has my own and it acts as a filter or a, gateway of sorts.** " He saw Naruto's confused look and decided to explain, " **The seal originally allowed for the ability to passively absorb natural energy. I altered it to also allow for easier use of my chakra and any others that enter your stream.** " Naruto nodded.

"I understand now, so how much power would I be able to use right now?" Naruto asked.

The Kyubi grunted, " **At most one tail, the original seal only allows that much.** "

"Earlier you spoke of training in your abilities, when would that take place? Also, I thought you didn't like your power being used anyways."

" **Firstly, the training won't be until your body has matured more, and I don't like my power being used, but that was with others. You are different, I feel like I should help you.** " Kyubi's eyes narrowed, " **But that doesn't change my opinion of you or humans, your kind is deadly and kills without reason.** "

"Yeah we do, you guys at least have reasons, mostly to defend yourselves." Naruto replied with a nod.

Kyubi nodded, " **Me and my siblings used to be peaceful but we were attacked for the possibility to seal us to use our power.** "

"I thought as much, after all, why would the Great Sage make you guys just to destroy what he created?" Naruto queried.

" **How do you know of him making us**?" Kyubi asked with wide-eyes.

"The stone tablet in the Uchiha shrine, it speaks of you and your siblings, Hagoromo Otsutsuki, and much more." Naruto replied.

" _ **Interesting**_." The Kyubi thought, " **Well it is time for you to leave, I desire my sleep.** "

Naruto exited his mindscape and activated his Sharingan and looked into a mirror in his room's bathroom. His mouth opened when he saw the third tomoe, he had tried for a long time to achieve the third tomoe and he has finally done it. He channeled chakra to his eyes and saw the Sharingan spin slowly and gain pace just as slowly. He eventually moved away from the mirror and moved back to his bed.

He pulled out a scroll labeled "Eight Gates" and unrolled it, basking in the knowledge of the forbidden art used by few. The gates were basically limiters placed on the human body to preserve it. The gates were usually opened by a sudden burst of chakra through one of the eight gates, named "Kaimon", "Kyūmon", "Seimon", "Shōmon", "Tomon", "Keimon", "Kyōmon", and "Shimon". Each gate surpassed that last and were located at key focal points of the chakra pathway. It was said that when all eight were opened, the user gained power greater that most, or any, Kage. But with power comes prices, usually anyways, and the cost of opening the last gate, Shimon, was death. Even the previous seven gates could be deadly if your body isn't trained. The gates put too much stress on the body and the body, literally and figuratively, crushes under the pressure.

After Naruto finished reading the scroll, and thought to himself that not once was there an incident where the gates were opened slowly. The pressure of opening the gates instantly puts stress on the chakra network. But if opened slowly, theoretically to Naruto, the body could accept the effects and strengthen itself accordingly. So as a side project, Naruto began slowly channeling chakra to the first gate, Kaimon, he slowly began to wedge open the gate. He knew this was going to be a slow and delicate process so acted accordingly. He spent the rest of the break until the third exam slowly opening the first gate.

All the teams in their room were called to an arena that was on the bottom floor of the tower. Everyone was lined up in the front of the door, facing the Sandaime for the reason as to why they were here.

"As some of you might know, the Chunin exams are for just determining if someone is prepared for the role. But it is a substitute for war. Way back when, the Chunin Exams were formed to ease tension between the countries." Hiruzen paused so everyone could catch up.

"Excuse me *cough*, Hokage-sama, may I *cough* resume the description?" A sickly man spoke up.

Hiruzen smiled, "Of course Hayate-kun."

"Thanks Hokage-sama, *cough*, since we have too many for the finals, we will *cough* have preliminary matches right now." Hayate told the group.

Kiba spoke up first, "Why can't we just continue on? And why do we have to do it now? My team just got back."

"I'm sorry but we cannot waste the nobles *cough* time, and so we have to have 8 fighters. And tough luck about your timing." Hayate responded, "Now continuing, this board behind me will cycle though names *cough* and land on two, and those two will fight until I deem fit to end the fight, or *cough* until one fighter just can't fight. But before we begin, does anyone wish *cough* to leave now? From here on it is individual testing."

A boy with grey hair raised his hand, "I would, proctor-san."

Hayate looked to his clipboard, "Kabuto…Yakushi?"

"Hai." Kabuto replied with a smile.

Hayate signaled for ANBU to apprehend the boy, and Kabuto's arms were held behind his back as well as his teammates.

"What's the meaning of this!?" Kabuto shouted.

"You are being taken in *cough* for suspected treachery for conspiring with a traitor." Hayate replied.

Kabuto's eyes widened, " _How did they know_? _Was it Naruto_? _If so, who would he have known_?"

The ANBU then vanished along with Kabuto and Hayate spoke up once more, "Now if no *cough* one else would like to forfeit, let's get started." He motioned to the board as it begun to cycle through names.

The board stopped and landed on two names, the result making Naruto smirk, " _I can't wait_."

On the board was both of his teammates names.

He looked to his teammates and smiled at them, "Do your best guys." Naruto told them.

Hime replied first, "Of course Naruto-kun, and you better not hold back Reo-kun."

Reo smiled, "I wasn't planning on it."

"Ok, you two stay *cough* down here, everyone head up to the stands." Hayate told them.

Reo and Hime moved to face one another, "You better not hold back either Hime." Reo told his female teammate.

"I wasn't planning on it either Reo-kun." Hime responded quickly.

"Ok, are you both ready?" Hayate asked them with a cough after, and he got a nod, "Alright, Hajime!"

The two teammates ran at each other, Reo throwing the first punch. The right fist was smacked away by Hime who threw a right hook to Reo's abdomen. Reo dodged the punch by kicking off the ground and in midair he tried a vertical spinning kick to Hime's head. The kick was stopped by Hime grabbing Reo's foot and throwing him down to the ground after enhancing her muscles with chakra. Reo hit the ground and grunted in retaliation, when Hime let his leg go, he jumped back to gain some distance.

" _Damn, I haven't even hit her once_." Reo thought.

Reo sought to fix this and went through a few hand signs before thinking, " **Fire Release: Great Fireball no Jutsu** ", and exhaling a large ball of fire.

Hime was surprised by this action but did not pause, and went through her own hand signs, and thought, " **Earth Release: Earth Wall no Jutsu** ". Upon her thought, an earth wall sprouted from the ground and protected her from the fire of Reo's jutsu.

Reo ran around the wall and did a spinning kick to Hime's side, successfully hitting her. He continued on and did a reverse kick right after, but Hime dodged the kick.

Back in the stands, Kakashi was asking Naruto some things. "I'm guessing you taught them those jutsu." Kakashi rather stated then asked.

"Yup, I tested their affinity and Reo had fire and Hime had earth and I taught them one jutsu since that was all they could get down." Naruto replied before he seemed to daze off, thinking of when he and Sasuke trained together.

"You would make a great sensei within time, Naruto." Kakashi told his student.

"Perhaps, but not any time soon." Naruto responded.

Back in the ring, Hime and Reo were in a grapple, each gripping the others hands and pushing on one another. Suddenly, Reo began forcing Hime to make hand seals with him. They ended on a snake seal and Reo jumped backwards, and spit out a ball of lava. Luckily Hime got out of the way, but Naruto was thinking of when Reo learned that.

" _Based on their affinities_ , _I'm sure Reo used Hime's Earth Chakra along with his own Fire Chakra and combined the two, successfully recreating Lava Release. Amazing, I would've never of thought of that. Using someone else's elemental chakra to complement your own to recreate a sub-element that would be otherwise impossible. Usually, one person can't have the control or focus to make it on their own._ " Naruto thought, and turned to Kakashi who was looking at him, "Don't look at me, that is all them."

Hime spit out her own lava that came in the form of rubber that covered the lava. She jumped at Reo with her right fist extended that smashed into Reo's face.

"Smart idea using my Earth Chakra, but too bad I thought of it first." Hime stated with a smile.

"I played right into your hand." Reo stated, " _God! I was outsmarted._ " He thought.

Reo recovered quickly and jumped towards Hime and slid to try and knock out her feet from beneath her. The attack did not connect, which was what Reo thought would happen, so he placed his hands on the ground behind him and vaulted from the ground. He did a tornado kick, spinning rapidly with his leg extended, and the kick landed right into Hime's forearms. Before Hime could grab his leg, he pulled his leg back and tried a punch that Hime grabbed instead.

She pulled him closer to her and tried to knee him in the gut, but Reo stopped it with his other hand and used his own leg to kick her in the side. After they separated, they fell to the floor before rushing one another again. Reo tried a right hook that Hime ducked under and tried her own right hook that almost landed in Reo's gut had he not spun around her, tripping her in the midst of the action.

Hime planted her hands into the ground and completed a somersault and landing perfectly. She jumped over five kunai that flew towards her and did a downward punch that was caught by Reo. In retaliation, Hime brought her left leg around to attempt to kick Reo in the right side of his head. Reo released Hime's fist and ducked under the kick and kicked the surprised Hime in the back. Hime landed about 10 feet away, and went through some hand signs and ended on a snake seal and slammed her hand on the ground, and spikes of earth began to shoot from the ground and nearly pierced Reo had he not jumped into the air before running through the same hand signs from before and exhaled a considerable fireball from his mouth. The fireball impacted the ground where Hime was as she jumped as far away as possible, which wasn't that far considering she was nearing chakra exhaustion. The explosion blasted Hime into a wall, successfully knocking her out, coincidentally at the same time as Reo hit the ground in unconsciousness as well.

"*cough* No winners of the first match, neither progress to finals." Hayate stated.

Naruto and Kakashi were in the stands talking, Naruto started the conversation, "That was a great fight if I do say so myself."

"It was, do you feel proud that you helped them reach that?" Kakashi responded then asked.

"I would've if I was like I was before. Sure I am proud of them, but not in myself, that was all them. I only pushed them in the right direction. They even recreated Lava Release." Naruto replied.

"You are a very humble shinobi, Naruto. That is a rare quality in our occupation. I can even say I am proud in myself in the way you turned out. You took everything you experienced and gained strength from it. Even I couldn't do that, I still wallow in the grief of self-blame in the death of my old teammates." Kakashi told Naruto.

The board on the wall rang out, signaling a new match was chosen.

"Temari and Choji Akimichi, please *cough* come down." Hayate called out.

Choji got inspirations from his teammates, and went down to the arena with a smile, thinking of the barbeque his sensei promised.

"What are you happy about fatty?" Temari asked with a grin, Choji's smile immediately fell.

"What did you call me?" Choji asked with venom leaking from his voice, which surprised many of the boy's classmates, they have never seen the boy mad.

"I called you fatty, fatty." Temari replied.

Hayate decided to start it already, "Hajime!"

Choji put his hands in the ram seal and shouted " **Multi-Size technique**!"

"Oh look, fatty got fatter." Temari antagonized.

Choji growled and his arms and legs pulled into his clothes as he begun to spin as he launched towards Temari. He was saying a mantra of "Roll roll roll" as he barreled towards Temari who was mildly surprised. But she didn't hold back and used her closed battle fan to bat him away like a baseball. Choji smashed into a wall, deflating as he did so. He tried his best to get back up after he hit the floor, he eventually got to his knees, and pulled out a container holding three pills, one red, one yellow, and one green. He removed the green pill and ate it, and almost immediately chakra exploded outward and chakra cloaked his body and he dashed towards Temari and tried to punch her but the punch was blocked by Temari's fan, and the girl was pushed back due to the strength of Choji.

He brought back his other fist and slammed it into the fan as well which launched Temari back into the other wall. Choji quickly made his way to Temari and tried to punch her in the gut but she jumped away quickly and opened her fan and swung it. The effects of such action were visibly nothing, but then cuts began to litter Choji's body. The boy fought back and jumped at the girl who began to ride her fan around. Choji managed to catch her and he slammed his fist into her face, as a result she flew away from her fan and slammed into the ground. She tried to get up but Choji landed near her, she slowly began to creep away from him. Eventually she began to run to her fan and she surprisingly made it and so she opened it to the third purple moon imprint and swung it and Choji was once again slammed into the wall and this time was cut even more which stopped all of his voluntary movements.

Hayate called the match, "Winner, Temari."

Once again the board began to cycle names, landing on two new names.

"Come on Akamaru boy!" The wild member of team eight shouted, making his teammate sigh.

"This is going to be troublesome, maybe I should just forfeit." The lazy Nara stated, but was quickly denied of that choice as his blonde teammate pushed him over the rails. "Troublesome blondes." Shikamaru whispered.

"Ok, the match between Kiba Inuzuka and Shikamaru Nara begins, Hajime." Hayate stated

"Sorry Shikamaru man, but I'll be moving on." Kiba stated with a grin.

"That doesn't sound too bad," Shikamaru stated as he began to raise his hand to forfeit but a voice stopped him.

"Shikamaru! If you forfeit I will tell you mother!" Naruto shouted.

Shikamaru's eyes widened, "You wouldn't dare."

"Oh I will, you better fight." Naruto responded.

"Fine," He replied, " _Troublesome blondes_." He thought.

"Ok Akamaru, Beast Human Clone Jutsu!" Kiba shouted as Akamaru transformed into Kiba.

Both Kiba and Akamaru and jumped into the air and began to spin to the point of which they turned into drills. Both drills shot towards Shikamaru who barely jumped away he tried to think of what to do but didn't get the chance to. The only thing he could think of right now was to let Kiba tire himself out. It didn't take long because the technique strains the user's body due to the wind resistance and sharp turns pulling on Kiba's body.

Within about five minutes, Kiba and Akamaru stopped spinning, and when they did they were breathing hard.

"Freaking Shika, stay still." Kiba panted out.

When Kiba and Akamaru stopped spinning, Shikamaru immediately went into his thinking position, which was his hands connected by the fingers and said fingers pointing to the floor as he kneeled. His eyes slowly opened when Kiba shot towards Shikamaru and tried to punch the boy, but none of the attacks connected, and when Shikamaru had the chance, he threw a kunai past him. About after Shikamaru threw his fifth and final kunai, he led Kiba to a spot in the arena and he pulled back his hand and wires wrapped around Kiba, stopping him from doing anything.

"Would you please surrender Kiba?" Shikamaru asked, he saw Kiba starting to move and put his hands in the rat seal and his shadow extended to Kiba's, "Now, please, I want to sleep."

Kiba growled, "Fine."

"Winner, Shikamaru Nara." Hayate called out.

Two more names appeared on the board, "Ino Yamanaka" and "Kankuro".

Both contestants made it to the floor and Kankuro began talking trash.

"Oh look, blondie wants to play shinobi." Kankuro stated with a smirk.

"Is every shinobi from Suna a trash-talker?" Ino questioned with a dead-pan look.

Kankuro sputtered out incoherent words, and Hayate spoke up, "Whether you are ready or not, Hajime."

Ino went through the hand signs for her mind jutsu to take over Kankuro, but as she fell, her conscious found that she couldn't take over Kankuro's conscious.

"Stupid Yamanaka," Kankuro stated as the bundle on his back unrolled and the real Kankuro stood behind his puppet, Crow.

"Winner, Kankuro." Hayate stated with disappointment.

The next names were Hinata and Neji (same as canon).

Naruto looked in anger at Neji, his Sharingan spinning with his anger. "I will avenge her Neji, and you will not like it when I do."

Everyone returned to the stands and Naruto continued to stare at Neji for little longer. The next names to appear were Tenten and Shino Aburame.

Both fighters made it to the floor and they stood apart from each other, quiet like shinobi should be.

Hayate looked to both of them, and after a cough, he shouted, "Hajime!"

Tenten took out her shuriken and hurled them at Shino, and would've hit had Shino not moved. Shino extended his arms to his sides and his bugs flowed from his sleeves and said bugs swarmed Tenten. Tenten was surprised by that, and didn't know what to do since she has never fought a bug user before, she didn't have a defense against bugs. She had senbon, but not enough to take out all the bugs, there had to have been at least five thousand of them, she only had about two hundred and fifty senbon. Before the bugs reached her though, she threw her hands into the air, "I forfeit!" She shouted.

She looked ashamed as she said it, but she knew when to cut her losses, she didn't know any Ninjutsu or any techniques that deal with radius effects. Sure she had bombs, but once again she didn't have enough of them. She moved up to the stands while looking to her feet.

The next names said Gaara and Lee, and both made it to the floor quickly. (Proceeds as Canon) Naruto was angered at the acts of Gaara, he had no remorse or regret. He cared not for the lives of others, but his own.

"One fighter is left, so Naruto Uzumaki is allowed access to the finals." Hayate stated.

Naruto cursed inwardly and said, "I was in the mood to fight."

Kakashi chuckled at his student's antics, "It'll be fine Naruto, and you'll get to kick but in the finals, especially since on one knows your abilities."

"You're right sensei." Naruto responded with a smile.

Hiruzen called everyone who won to the floor, "Okay so Anko-chan here has a box with numbers, you will choose one and it will choose your place on the list. First, Shino please come pick your number."

Shino nodded and chose a number, "4." He told Hayate who wrote it down.

Next Naruto chose a number, "1." He said with a smile, "Of course I got number one."

Next Temari, "5."

Next Neji, "2." He stated while inwardly cursing his luck.

Next Kankuro, "3." He didn't care he got the bug kid.

Next Shikamaru, "Troublesome, 6."

Lastly Gaara, "7."

Hayate recited the order of fights, "First match, Naruto Uzumaki versus Neji Hyuga. Second match, Shino Aburame versus Kankuro. Third match, Shikamaru Nara versus Temari. Fourth match, Gaara versus winner of match one."

Hiruzen spoke next, "The finals will take place in one month, in that time it is recommended for you to train and acquire new skills. So I will see you in one month in the stadium in the village."

Naruto began to walk away to check on his teammates, and after which he would get home to get some rest and talk with Kakashi the next day.

 **I hope you enjoyed chapter four, please leave a review as it helps me make decisions. Come back later for chapter 5 and I'll talk to you then.**


	6. Chapter 5

**Welcome to chapter five of Perseverance.**

 **For the one who asked why I killed Sasuke, he perished to progress the story. I have an image in mind to where Naruto gains the powers of Indra and Asura, the way I saw that happening was Sasuke dying and Naruto gaining Sasuke's future abilities. It may be complicated, but to summarize it is to focus the lead into one character basically, to make a new Kaguya if you will. The difference is that I am trying to give Naruto personality, not only his own, but Sasuke's as well. The two personalities will eventually merge to create something new. I have read many things where Naruto has power but no personality, he eats the chakra fruit and just strives to take away chakra. It is my goal to make Naruto strong, make him work for it, and also have personality to back it up. Someone told me it is a very hard thing to do. I understand this, especially in the Narutoverse where there are many abilities and bloodline abilities, basically a lot to spoil a child with. The drawback of this is difficulty giving "life" to Naruto. So bottom line is that Naruto is a new Hagoromo and future Kaguya yet more personalized than both of them.**

 **Without further ado, let's get into chapter five.**

Naruto was just now leaving the Forest of Death, and Kakashi appeared right next to him.

"Hey Naruto!" Kakashi shouted to get Naruto's attention.

Said blonde turned around and responded, "Hai sensei?"

"Hokage-sama said he wanted you to go see him tomorrow for some things concerning your training." Kakashi stated.

"Are you not going to train me sensei?" Naruto asked with confusion.

"I would, but Hokage-sama has someone special for you." Kakashi replied with a shrug.

"Okay, so he said tomorrow?" Naruto asked.

"Hai." Kakashi responded.

"Okay then, I'll see you later sensei, I'm gonna go get some rest." Naruto stated while walking away.

Kakashi nodded, and went his own way. Naruto walked to his apartment slowly and thought about random things. But by the halfway mark to his apartment, he just began to try and open the gate of Healing, the second of the Eight Gates. This gate would be harder to open than the last due to having more restraints placed on the body than the first.

Naruto made it to his apartment and went straight to his bed, but didn't lay down. One thing Naruto took to doing was meditating instead of normal sleeping, besides the times when he meditated while laying down of course.

Tomorrow eventually came, and Naruto took a shower and ate some breakfast before heading to the Hokage tower. He exited his apartment and locked the door behind him. He went on his way to the tower while pulling his hood and mask up. When he got to the tower, he didn't feel like going through the lobby, so he walked up the wall to the Hokage Office's window before hopping through.

"Hello Jiji." Naruto began with a wave, "Did you need me?"

Hiruzen jumped at the boy's words, but replied nonetheless, "Please don't do that Naruto-kun, I get enough of that from my student. And yes, I have found two people to train you in specific fields."

Naruto's eyes showed confusion, "Why two? Who are they?"

"One of them will train you correctly in your acquired doujutsu, and the other will train you in…other things." Hiruzen responded. "One is Jiraiya of the Sannin, and the other…is Itachi Uchiha."

Naruto's eyes widened, "Jiraiya-sama and Itachi?"

Hiruzen nodded, "Yes, Itachi will teach you in the Sharingan's abilities, especially with both eyes. And Jiraiya will teach you less specific things."

"Thanks Jiji." Naruto stated with a smile.

"You're not angered at Itachi?" Hiruzen asked with confusion.

"Nope, he didn't want to kill his clan, I saw it in his eyes. I remember from our conversation about the massacre, you had a look in your eyes that said that you knew we knew who did it." Naruto replied, "Me and Sasuke promised not to hate him and try to bring him back." Naruto said with a faraway look in his eyes.

"That is actually surprising Naruto-kun, I didn't think you could catch details like that." Hiruzen stated.

"You'll find, Jiji, that I am really observant." Naruto responded with a chuckle.

"Well your teachers are waiting for you in training ground 35 Naruto-kun." Hiruzen said with a chuckle as well.

"I'll talk to you later then Jiji." Naruto turned to jump out the window, "Bye Jiji!" He said as he flew out the window.

Hiruzen face-palmed, " _He is already taking after Jiraiya_."

Naruto made it to training ground 35 in about five minutes at the speed he was traveling. He made it to see two people sitting next to one another. One was wearing an ANBU outfit without the mask and the other was wearing a red haori over a green kimono and matching pants.

"Hello Jiraiya-sama, Itachi-san." Naruto greeted.

Jiraiya spoke first, "Hello Naruto, are you ready for training?"

Naruto nodded before Itachi spoke next, "You know the Kage Bunshin, right?" He got another nod, "Okay, I want you to make one and send it with me."

Naruto followed the orders and created the required Bunshin and sent it with Itachi.

"Okay Naruto, do you know the water walking technique?" Jiraiya asked, getting a nod. " _It is best I wait for the summoning until later_." Jiraiya put his hand to his chin, "Wanna learn a jutsu that made the Yondaime famous?"

"Of course," Naruto smiled and nodded ecstatically, "Lord Fourth is my idol."

"That is what I thought, the jutsu is called the Rasengan, an A-Rank jutsu based on Shape Manipulation." Jiraiya put his hand forward, chakra swirling around his palm. "The finished product should look like this."

Naruto nodded and put his hand forward and shortly after, chakra began to swirl around his palm. Jiraiya heard the sound of the Rasengan and turned around to see Naruto with a Rasengan in his palm.

Jiraiya's mouth hung open, " _Already? It took me three months to perfect the technique and Minato years to develop it._ " Jiraiya shook his head of his shock and spoke again, "Okay then, turns out you already completed it. Your sensei did say you were a genius." Jiraiya took out a scroll, "This scroll possess some Fire, Earth, and Water Jutsu, about 3 of each. If what Kakashi said is true, then it doesn't matter if you have an affinity for them because your reserves are greater than most Kage level shinobi. For the entire month, I'll let you learn the jutsu for 4 days, then three days will be spent on Taijutsu and other things."

"Understood, Jiraiya-sama." Naruto said with a nod while he created some clones that read the scroll and chose a jutsu.

" _He will surpass all of us someday_." Jiraiya thought.

Naruto's clone with Itachi was going over the Sharingan's basic abilities.

"The two categories of abilities are the eye of hypnosis and the eye of perception. The eye of hypnosis deals with being able to dispel genjutsu and place them. The eye of perception allows for faster perception, allowing you to see chakra while giving color to it, and copy jutsu due to seeing the movement of chakra and seeing how it is molded." Itachi paused, "Can you activate your Sharingan for me?"

Naruto did so while saying, "You mean your brother's." Naruto eyes glazed over, "This is basically his Sharingan, I only have it because of the essence transfer."

Itachi's eyes widened, "Essence transfer?"

"Yes, the jutsu in the library allowing for the transfer of the Sharingan and chakra along with it." Naruto replied.

" _He actually learned it_." Itachi's face went neutral, "It is tragic though, I mourned for his passing for a long time."

"Yes, imagine having the image of his death over and over again within your mind." Naruto said, and neither noticed his Sharingan spin rapidly and gain a new pattern for a second.

"Getting back on topic," Itachi said, snapping Naruto from his thoughts, "You appear to have three tomoe already, so I will teach you how to properly use it like an Uchiha."

-One Month Later-

Naruto was getting dressed quickly as he got ready to leave to the Chunin Stadium. He was excited to show everyone what he could do, and was ready to open the eyes of many. He exited his home with a hop in his step and quickly arrived at his destination. Naruto entered the stadium and walked to the center of the stadium. The stadium was relatively empty, so Naruto sat down and began to meditate and gain some foresight for his fights.

" _Neji Hyuga, known as a prodigy among his clan. My information states he knows the Kaiten, a technique of the main branch. He knows the Eight Trigrams, and is proficient with it. Gaara, able to use sand-based jutsu and contains Shukaku. Not much else is known of Gaara. Shino, he will most likely win against Kankuro, he uses his clans bugs. Temari, Wind Release user, most likely will win because Shikamaru will get tired by the end."_ Naruto thought.

He sat there, and much later people began pouring in by the minute. When about an hour passed, everyone was seated and every one of the contestants arrived. By that time, Naruto stood and looked around. He noticed Hayate wasn't here, and instead saw Genma Shiranui. The man had his iconic toothpick in his mouth and was waiting for the signal to start.

The Hokage in the highest booth stood and addressed the crowd, "Without further ado, will commence the finals of the Chunin Exams."

Genma spoke next, "If Naruto Uzumaki and Neji Hyuga would stay while the others go to the competitor's booth."

Naruto looked among the crowd looking for some pink hair, he eventually found it near the left side of the crowd. Sakura was sitting next to Kiba and Hinata, and was smiling at him. Naruto smiled in response to his old teammate, and waved at her before turning to his opponent.

"Just give up Uzumaki, fate has already declared me the winner." Neji said with a smirk that spoke arrogance that hid fear.

"Fate, such a misunderstood concept." Naruto replied, and decided to explain, "Fate is what we make, not what is given to us. You'd do well to get that into your thick skull."

"Fool, only a failure would believe that. If it was me, I wouldn't have let my teammate die on my first mission out of the village." Neji said, hoping to get a reaction.

Naruto chuckled, "If anyone is "going against fate", it'd be you. After all, aren't the side branch supposed to serve the main branch?" Naruto asked, getting a scowl from Neji.

"You don't know anything Uzumaki." Neji growled out.

"But I do, you of the side branch, son on the late Hizashi Hyuga, and nephew of Hiashi Hyuga. You went against fate by almost killing your cousin, Hinata Hyuga in a fit of anger towards the main branch." Naruto responded with a smile.

"Start the match proctor." Neji growled as he activated his Byakugan.

Genma scowled at being told what to do by a genin, "Fine, match between Neji Hyuga and Naruto Uzumaki begins, Hajime!" He said as he jumped backwards.

Neji shot forward and his palm was on a path to Naruto's heart, and Naruto dodged at the last second. Naruto used his own palm and thrust it into Neji's elbow. The strike hurt, because like Neji's hands, Naruto channeled chakra into his hands. The difference was Naruto overloaded his hands to get a radius effect to affect the tenketsu because he couldn't exactly pinpoint them.

Neji shouted in pain at his tenketsu being closed off. He shot towards Naruto again tried to strike Naruto again, but the same thing happened, but this time Naruto didn't close the tenketsu. He didn't want to end the fight to quickly.

"Those who do the same thing and expect different results are insane." Naruto stated.

"Shut up!" Neji shouted as he tried to strike Naruto once more.

The next thing to happen surprised everyone, Naruto began spinning and around him, a faint dome spun with him. Neji tried to stop himself but wasn't quick enough and collided with the barrier, getting blasted away.

"H-how do y-you…know a-a Hyuga technique?" Neji gasped out slowly.

"I have my ways." Naruto neutrally replied.

This served to anger Neji, and he jumped back up to try and attack Naruto. He was using both arms now, having slowly reopened his tenketsu previously. But this didn't help him at all, because Naruto, without his Sharingan, was weaving between Neji's strikes. The Hyuga continued to growl.

"Stay still!" Neji shouted.

"It wouldn't really be a fight if I did, now would it?" Naruto replied with a smile to antagonize Neji.

As time passed, Neji's strikes seemed to fall in quality and dodging them was getting easier. At one point, Naruto grabbed Neji's wrist as Neji's palm was about to hit him and pulled him closely only to lodge his knee into Neji's gut. Said Hyuga spat blood as a result, and Naruto didn't relent and did a backwards tornado kick to Neji's face. Neji flew backwards back into the wall, and gasped as his back impacted with said wall.

"How about this? I close my eyes after I heal you, and you try to hit me then?" Naruto asked, with no hint of arrogance in his voice, only confidence. His tone was heard by all and they laughed at Neji.

Naruto rushed forward and placed a seal on Neji that faded as it healed Neji. Then Naruto jumped back and put his headband over his eyes, and got into a stance where his left foot was in front of his right, his knees were bent and his right arm was to his back and the left extended with the palm facing Neji.

During his month of training, Naruto honed his sensory ability to be able to sense movements before they reached anywhere close to him. He did this by reading the electromagnetic waves emanating from Neji's brain that sent signals to the rest of his body, Naruto could catch these signals now, and could react off of them accordingly. He sensed Neji was going for a strike to his face and tilted himself to left, and rotated off his left heel to be around to the back of Neji. The sudden draft of air made Naruto's headband and clothes move along with the draft, before he sent a kick to Neji's back. The kick connected and knocked Neji to the floor. Neji got up angrily and jumped to attempt an overhead strike. This didn't work however when Naruto rolled under Neji.

When Neji tried his next strike, Naruto gathered chakra in his palm and slammed it into Neji's stomach, making Neji gasp like before. The strike sent Neji backwards again.

"So much for you being the "prodigy of the Hyuga"." Naruto remarked.

Neji growled, "Shut up! You are within my field of divination." Neji said as he got into a new stance. His body tilted down to the left with his right leg forward and his left back and bent at the knee opposed to his right that was straight. Both arms were extended to the front and back, the right and left respectively.

"Two palms!" Neji shouted while he thrusted his index and middle fingers of both hands forwards, aiming for the shoulder tenketsu.

Naruto tilted horizontally, letting the strikes pass right by him.

"Four palms!" Neji shouted once more, four strikes this time aimed at four areas of his abdomen.

Naruto dodged once more, tilting his body to react to each set of two.

"Eight palms!" Neji shouted again, eight strikes aiming towards Naruto again.

Like before, Naruto flowed right by the strikes of Neji.

"Sixteen palms!" Neji shouted, once again throwing more strikes.

Naruto repeated his previous actions, passing right by the strikes.

This continued for the thirty-two palms and the sixty-four palms, Naruto dodging every strike. This angered Neji and he got even sloppier with his strikes. Naruto elevated off this and placed his palms together to gather a large amount of chakra before he slammed both palms into Neji's chest. On his palms were two identical seals designed to suppress the victim's chakra. After the strike, Neji's access to his chakra was severed and laid in a messy heap on the ground.

Genma appeared again, "Winner of the first match, Naruto Uzumaki!"

The crowd actually cheered, Naruto was surprised by this, he suspected no reaction for the civilians, perhaps anger at defeating a member of a prestigious clan, but nothing was felt. Naruto smiled genuinely and jumped up to the contestant booth. He was congratulated by Shino and Shikamaru, and he thanked them. Naruto then looked back to Sakura, who looked to be lost in her thoughts, but was smiling nonetheless. He decided to go see his old teammate, and say "Hi", after all, he hasn't spoked to her in a long time.

He approached the pinkette, now civilian, girl with a smile.

"Hey Sakura-chan." He greeted with a smile.

"Hello Naruto-kun." She responded with an equal smile.

Naruto extended his arms outwards, "You gonna leave me hanging?" He said with a laugh.

Sakura smiled and got up to hug her old teammate, "How have you been Naruto-kun?"

"I've been great, Kakashi-sensei has taught me a lot." Naruto replied. "It would've been great for you to still be with us Sakura-chan."

"I know, but I don't think I could handle the Shinobi life style." She sadly replied.

"That's fine Sakura-chan. I understand, you were hurt a lot by it." Naruto responded, knowing she would know what he meant by "it".

"But look at you. You are still getting stronger from it." Sakura replied.

"I have also experience more pain than you, I was there with Sasuke when the Uchiha incident occurred." Naruto replied.

"I know, but still." Sakura responded.

"It was nice getting to connect with you again Sakura-chan, but I better go stop Shikamaru from forfeiting." Naruto stated with a laugh, "I'll talk to you after?"

Sakura nodded and Naruto ran back to the contestant booth and quickly made it to Shikamaru who was about to say he forfeited. Right before the "f" of "forfeit" came out of Shikamaru's mouth, Naruto pushed him over the rails. The responding thought of Shikamaru was, " _Troublesome blondes._ "

Naruto chuckled, "Remember, if you forfeit without doing anything then I'll tell your mother!"

Shikamaru sighed before getting up slowly and dusting himself off before walking over to the center, after all, it would be troublesome to walk back up.

Genma shook his head with a chuckle, " _The laziness of the Naras will always make me laugh_." He then got serious, "Alright, the fight between Shikamaru Nara and Temari of the Sand will now commence! Hajime!" He said as he jumped back.

"This is so troublesome." Shikamaru started off by saying.

Apparently Temari took this the wrong way, " _Is he thinking I'm troublesome because I'm a girl?_ " She got angered and opened her fan and swung it, releasing a gust of wind that blew Shikamaru away.

Shikamaru held a bored face through it all, " _Troublesome_." He thought as he landed next to a tree. He sat down in his thinking position and quickly thought of a plan.

Temari was kept waiting for about two minutes before she got impatient and swung her fan, releasing winds that cut the trees to pieces. Shikamaru however was not at the tree, before the wind burst, Shikamaru threw a shuriken around Temari that he substituted with. After the dust from the debris of the tree cleared, Shikamaru was behind Temari with his hands in the rat seal and his shadow was connected to hers. Or else it would've if it was her, Temari vanished in a vortex of wind.

It turns out that what Shikamaru caught was a wind clone. And he quickly had to dodge a swing of a closed fan, he ducked the first time then jumped over it the second time. After he landed from the second dodge he jumped back a considerable distance, but didn't get time to chill, as Temari opened her fan to the third moon painted on the inside. She swung it and a large gust of wind burst through the stadium, luckily seals protected against elemental jutsu so the civilians didn't get cut.

Shikamaru hid somewhere luckily and immediately thought of something. He would discretely use his shadow to grab hers and if that didn't work, he would make her move to where he could get her. So he set his plan into play and tried to connect to the girl's shadow, but she jumped away just in time. He moved to another location and threw some kunai with explosive notes on them right in front of her and she jumped away from them. She landed in the center of the arena and kept an eye out for Shikamaru. She saw something move in her peripherals and dodged out of the way of a kunai, but failed to notice another go into the air.

She smirked just until she felt she couldn't move. Out of the remaining trees came Shikamaru who had his hands in the Rat seal and his over shirt was missing.

She scowled, "How did you catch me?"

He shrugged, "When you dodged my kunai, I threw another into the air that was held up by my shirt." He looked up to his shirt so Temari could see it. Shikamaru began to raise his hand, and before what everyone expected he did the opposite, "I forfeit." He said.

Everyone face-faulted at this, " _He had it_!" were the common thoughts.

"I'm low on chakra, I couldn't hold this any longer." Shikamaru stated.

Genma nodded, "Very well. Victor of the second match is Temari."

Shikamaru walked back up to the contestant's box and was instantly berated by Naruto.

Naruto was gripping his head, "You had it in the bag! If only you held out longer you lazy…grr!" He growled out.

Shikamaru just merely shrugged and sat against the wall.

Genma called out, "The semi-finals will take place shortly! For now just get anything you may need!"

Naruto began to meditate to prepare for his next match, he started to increase the flow of chakra to the first gate to speed up the process of opening it. Shortly after the gate opened, and if Naruto wasn't suppressing his chakra, everyone would've felt a pulse of chakra. The only visible difference was the increase in muscle mass.

When Naruto opened the gate, Gaara and he were called to the floor.

"Are you both ready?" Genma asked while looking between them.

Both people nodded, Naruto got into his Taijutsu stance with his legs spread and bent, the left ahead of the right, his right arm behind his back and his left extended in front of him. Sand began to circle Gaara who gave an insane smile.

"Hajime!" Genma shouted as he jumped back instantly.

Good thing he did because a wave of sand rushed Naruto. Naruto flipped over the sand and ran at Gaara. A wall of sand erupted in front of Gaara and Naruto punched it, and surprisingly the sand exploded. Naruto then got close to the ground and kicked Gaara into the air, his other foot following shortly after, and it was repeated until Gaara was 30 feet in the air. Naruto then appeared behind Gaara and was spinning like a tornado, his foot impacted with Gaara's back as he shouted "Konoha Whirlwind." The kick did a lot of damage considering Naruto channeled Lightning chakra to his foot.

Gaara slammed into the ground at breakneck speeds and Naruto appeared above him and began a relentless barrage of punches on the Jinchurriki's abdomen. During all of this, Naruto didn't close his eyes and paid attention to every small detail. So he noticed when Gaara substituted, and he looked around to see Gaara with his hand extended and Sand following it.

" _Water Release: Violent Eroding Wave_ ," Naruto thought as his hands left a Dragon hand sign and he shot water from his mouth in the form of a giant wave.

The water from the jutsu hit the sand and made it heavier, causing it to fall. Gaara sent more sand only for Naruto to repeat the same thing. Naruto ended the cycle by appearing behind Gaara and bringing his leg back before slamming it into Gaara's back.

The next thing Naruto did was secretly make a shadow clone before he rushed Gaara once more with fuinjutsu glowing on his hands. The palms of Naruto slammed into Gaara's back and shut off Gaara's connection to his chakra and, by extension, Shukaku's.

"Winner of the semi-finals, Naruto Uzumaki!" Genma shouted, getting cheers from everyone just before feathers floated down from the air.

" _Genjutsu, Mass dispel_." Naruto thought, releasing the genjutsu over everyone.

An explosion erupted from the Kage stands, and Naruto rushed towards it, creating more Shadow Clones on the way. He got there to see a purple barrier in his way, and the Hokage inside with Orochimaru.

Naruto went through a few hand signs and his hands glowed a brilliant purple that matched the barrier. He placed his hands on the barrier and for a short time the barrier opened, but closed after Naruto entered. He jumped to the Sandaime's side and landed in a three point landing.

"Are you okay Sandaime-sama?" Naruto asked with respect considering they are in a battle.

"Yes Naruto-kun." Hiruzen replied. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm here to help you." Naruto responded.

"I know you have gotten stronger in your month break but Orochimaru is another league." Hiruzen told Naruto.

Naruto frowned, and his blue eyes shifted to red with three tomoe, "I'm wounded by your lack of faith Sandaime-sama." A red cloak erupted around him, his pupil turned into a diamond shape.

Orochimaru smirked, and let out a chuckle, "The hope of a child. It is weak." He finished with a disinterested look.

"We'll see Orochimaru." Naruto said as he vanished and he threw a right punch towards Orochimaru's face, only barely missing.

" _The speed_." Orochimaru thought, surprised.

Chakra exploded from Naruto, the cause was Naruto forcefully opening the first four gates. His speed was even greater now, and Naruto managed to hit Orochimaru in the gut then in the face. Naruto instantly closed the gates and continued fighting. Orochimaru appeared next to Naruto and tried a punch, and Naruto just barely dodged it. To get away, Naruto used the **Shunshin** and moved away from Orochimaru and immediately went through hand signs, stopping on the Snake seal, and from Naruto's hands was a dragon that gained size as it went, and was just about to reach Orochimaru had the man not faded into the ground.

When the dragon impacted the roof, Naruto pulled more chakra from Kyubi to sprout two tails, and caught the arm of Orochimaru that came from the ground. Naruto looked into Orochimaru's eyes, and Orochimaru saw not the red eyes of the Sharingan, or the blue of Naruto's eyes, but a combination of both that formed a dark purple.

Chakra gathered into Naruto's eyes and put Orochimaru into a Genjutsu, but the man dropped and turned into mud. Orochimaru appeared on the other side of the roof and went through a string on hand signs and ended on the Snake seal. "Kuchiyose: Edo Tensei!"

Two coffins began breaking from the ground and stood tall, one having the Kanji for "First", and the second had "Second". The covers fell off to show two people neither Naruto nor Hiruzen expected.

The two people were none other than the Shodaime and Nidaime of Konoha. Hashirama and Tobirama Senju. Orochimaru quickly placed one kunai in each Hokage's head, and both kunai had special tags on them.

Hashirama held his hands in the Snake seal and wood roots sprouted from the ground and rushed both Naruto and Hiruzen who had long since discarded his Hokage robes and was in his battle outfit. Both shinobi jumped around the roots and began running at the resurrected kage. Naruto rushed Tobirama and Hiruzen, Hashirama. Naruto created a shadow clone that engaged Orochimaru. The shadow clone was different than most in the sense that it can take more of a beating.

Hiruzen engaged Hashirama and began a bout of Taijutsu. Unfortunately, Hashirama held the high ground and Hiruzen couldn't get a hit in. This was only cemented in the fact that Hashirama was using his Wood Release. Hiruzen held his hands in the Tiger seal and spit out a large ball of fire that managed to hit the Shodaime. The fire cleared to show a degrading Hashirama that was in the process of reforming.

" _Naruto_!" Hiruzen thought, if Hashirama was reforming, then Tobirama most likely could as well. It was only a matter of time until Naruto ran out of fuel.

Speaking of Naruto, he was doing well, better than Hiruzen was with Hashirama anyway. He still wasn't winning though, and the hits he did score easily healed.

Tobirama went through the Dragon and Bird hand signs and a large water dragon sprouted from the air. This surprised Naruto, since he only read of Tobirama's skill with Water Release. Despite Naruto's surprise, he dodged the dragon and went through his hand signs and thought, " _Fire Release: Great Dragon Fire Jutsu_."

Naruto's fire dragon spiraled around Tobirama's and they appeared to be at a stalemate. Both dragons then flew towards their creator's enemy, and they both dodged the dragon that hit where they previously were. Naruto's Sharingan recorded Tobirama's styles, and created counter measures for said styles. Naruto and Tobirama appeared to be fighting on even ground, but Naruto was tiring quickly, after all, it is hard to fight a kage, weakened or not. Naruto knew he would have no hope against Hashirama. But Naruto saw the good parts of this fight, he was learning Taijutsu from Tobirama, albeit not consciously.

Naruto's clone with Orochimaru was doing considerably better than his creator. The clone was able to push back Orochimaru with the use of two tails of Kyubi Chakra.

"I ought to thank you Orochimaru, with your seal, I am able to control the Kyubi's chakra easier, but your essence does not haunt me." Naruto told the snake Sannin.

Orochimaru was scowling at his loss of an asset such as Naruto. " _The loss of another Sharingan, too bad Sasuke was cremated, then I could've used his DNA_."

The clone managed to get within Orochimaru's guard and uppercutted him, nearly breaking Orochimaru's neck. Orochimaru grunted in pain as he was sent through trees that were made by Hashirama.

The clone dodged a punch from a regenerated Orochimaru and kicked Orochimaru in the stomach before punching him away with Lightning chakra infused with the fist. The clone didn't relent and appeared right by Orochimaru who was getting up from an imprint from a tree. Orochimaru was then punched in the face by the clone and then got kicked in the neck. Orochimaru got up and went through a great amount of hand signs and landed on a Snake seal and shot snakes from his sleeves. The clone held his hands in the Snake seal as well and slammed his right hand on the roof.

An explosion of smoke covered the area and everyone felt a powerful presence, and from the smoke, Orochimaru heard a roar, and was genuinely scared.

The smoke cleared to show a large animal, it had the face of a humanoid, the body of a lion and wings of an eagle.

-Flashback-

"Naruto come over here!" Jiraiya shouted.

"Hai sensei." Naruto responded after moving towards his sensei.

"I have something that I have wanted to give you, it is in a place I hold dear to me." Jiraiya replied, "I need you to follow me."

Naruto nodded and followed his sensei. They soon arrived at a house that was in the woods, it was not that fancy of a place, but looked like it could support a small family. The walls were white concrete, the roof was made of grey tiles, the land around it was littered with nature. Jiraiya led Naruto inside to a room that held a scroll, and on it said "Mythical".

"My student, the Yondaime held this scroll. It is a summoning scroll of the Mythical creatures. He ended up using the toad scroll, but held onto it for anyone worthy. Only one person has ever signed it, and I can't tell who it is, as the calligraphy is dated and very ancient." Jiraiya told Naruto. "I'm sure he would trust you with it." He said as he removed the scroll from the pedestal and handed it to Naruto.

Naruto unrolled it and saw the name that was spoken of, and Jiraiya was right, the writing was very old. But good thing he reads literally almost anything he finds. He could point out a few characters, and eventually deciphered it, and the name was- "Hagoromo Otsutsuki." Naruto said out loud.

"What?" Jiraiya asked with shock written on his face.

"The name is Hagoromo Otsutsuki, the Sage of Six Paths. I've seen this writing before on the Uchiha tablet." Naruto replied.

Jiraiya was shocked beyond belief, " _The Great Sage used this scroll_?"

"You said I could have this?" Naruto asked as he turned to his sensei.

"Yes, it is yours now." Jiraiya replied absentmindedly.

Naruto signed his name in blood and placed his handprint on the scroll.

-End Flashback-

Naruto just summoned the Great Sphinx, he had long since met the summons and befriended them. Orochimaru was scared when he saw the summon, he was frozen, as was the Shodaime and Nidaime, the fear spread from the connection of Orochimaru and them. Hiruzen took this time to explain the plan to Naruto, and Naruto had no choice but to accept it, because either way would end the same way.

Hiruzen ran through all twelve hand signs and an eerie feeling spread around the barrier. His two clones did the same and they all pulled on the souls of Hashirama, Tobirama, and Orochimaru. And with the added will of Naruto, they had no hope. What Hiruzen had done was summon the Shinigami, and he was going to seal the souls within Naruto ensure they would never be able to be released ever again.

The side effects were unpredictable, whether or not their abilities would spread to Naruto just like the Kyubi. The sealing was quickly completed, and in the process, Naruto requested the Shinigami destroy Orochimaru's soul. After the whole ordeal, he looked to Hiruzen to see him on the ground gasping in pain.

"Jiji!" Naruto shouted in surprise, and rushed to his side.

Hiruzen smiled, "It's okay Naruto-kun," He breathed in, "This was the way I wanted to go out, I'm a warrior, we seek to go out in battle."

"I know," Naruto replied, tears beginning to fall, "But it doesn't make it hurt any less. I already experienced this with Sasuke, I didn't want it to happen to you too."

"Naruto-kun," He got Naruto's attention, "We all have a time, some earlier than others." He said, speaking about Sasuke, "But I know you will work through this, you always do. You are stronger than most that I know." Hiruzen smiled.

"I just wish I didn't have to lose you so early just like with Sasuke." Naruto replied.

"This will only make you stronger, I know you will surpass everyone within time. I know you will become Hokage, and a good one at that." Hiruzen stated, as he gave his last breath.

Naruto shook and held Hiruzen close to him, tears freely streaming down his face. "JIJI!" He shouted in sorrow. The ANBU on the outside silently mourned for their fallen leader.

Unbeknownst to everyone, Naruto's Sharingan began to spin furiously, the tomoe fusing into three intersecting red ellipses with a black background. The tears of water then turned to tears of blood, and as suddenly as it came, it was gone.

Naruto closed his eyes and created four clones to capture Orochimaru's followers. They were brought before him, three males and one female. The clones knocked them out, and bound them before giving them to the ANBU. The leader approached Naruto and placed his hand upon his shoulder.

"Come on Naruto-san, we have to secure Hokage-sama's body, and check on everything else." The ANBU stated with sadness in his voice.

"Hai." Naruto said as he laid Hiruzen down and stood up, "Take care of him will you?" Naruto said as he vanished.

Naruto was running around the village, dispatching threats, and securing the village and took out a snake that was summoned. The snake was taken out by Naruto's Griffin that was the size of the boss of the Toads. One of Naruto's clones fought Gaara who was in his Bijuu form after being woken up by his Baki, Gaara's sensei. The Jinchuuriki was awoken in the woods, and transformed immediately after. One clone saw Gaara and decided to take him out, so he ran to when the Bijuu was located.

The clone landed on a branch in front of the Bijuu, and held his hands in the Bird hand seal, and released a torrent of water from his mouth that slammed into the giant tanuki. Said tanuki spotted Naruto and started ranting.

" **You dare attack me puny human?!** " Shukaku questioned.

"Yup," Naruto replied and held his hands in the Snake hand sign, " _Earth Release: Swamp of the Underworld_."

The ground sank and held Shukaku within thick mud. Naruto then jumped up and tried to reach Gaara who was on Shukaku's head. The path was troublesome because of Shukaku using his sand to stop him, but eventually, Naruto made it and punched Gaara in the forehead, effectively waking up the boy.

The body of Shukaku began to crumble, and Gaara fell to the floor. Naruto jumped to the floor and approached Gaara who freaked out at the presence of Naruto.

"It's okay Gaara, I'm not going to hurt you if you don't give me a reason." Naruto held his hands up, "It hurts doesn't it?" Naruto asked him, getting a curious look, "The loneliness. It hurts, we are alike Gaara. Both of us were hated by our village, but I rose above it and showed them I wasn't a demon. You can do the same, I can help with your seal, lock away the influence of Shukaku. I hold Kyubi so I know how it feels to be hated by something you didn't do."

"Can you really fix my seal?" Gaara asked.

Naruto nodded, "I can, I just need to see your seal."

Gaara nodded as well, and pulled up his shirt to show a seal in the center of his torso.

Naruto cringed, "Whoever did this did not know what they were doing. This is just a storage seal…it will be tricky, but I can fix it." Naruto said as his index finger began to glow on his right hand, and he wrote a six point seal over Gaara's stomach.

After the seal was complete, Naruto's left hand began to glow as well as his right, and he placed a hand over each seal. What Naruto was doing was transferring the chakra from the first seal to the next my using his body as a medium. Within five minutes, Naruto transferred all the chakra to the new seal, except a small portion that Naruto accidentally absorbed, just like when he was younger and working on the leaf balancing exercise. This small portion increased the amount of chakra that Naruto can produce at a time.

"It's finished Gaara, it isn't as good as mine, but it is way better than before." Naruto told Gaara.

"Thank you Uzumaki, I don't hear its voice anymore." Gaara told Naruto.

"Please, call me Naruto, Gaara." Naruto said.

"Alright Naruto, thank you." Gaara said as he began to stand.

"Hey Gaara, would you like to be friends?" Naruto asked.

Gaara's eyes widened, "Friends?"

"Yes, I wouldn't even mind being considered you brother due to our circumstances." Naruto said with a smile.

"I would love that Naruto." Gaara said with a genuine smile.

Naruto nodded, and vanished away and finished checking out the village.

Naruto even came across Sakura and she saw the pain he was in, and asked about it.

"Hokage-sama was killed." Naruto told her.

Sakura gasped, "I'm so sorry Naruto-kun, I know how much he meant to you."

"It's fine Sakura-chan, it isn't the first time I've lost someone." Naruto told her, and she immediately knew what he spoke of.

"You can't blame yourself for either event, you couldn't have done anything." She told him while she embraced him.

"I could've saved Sasuke at least, but I was weak, and I won't allow it any longer." Naruto told her, "I will ask Jiraiya-sama to take me on a training trip to train me to stop this things from happening. It's getting ridiculous, I train and I train and still…I am helpless."

"Naruto…" Sakura started, "I don't know what I can say, except that I have faith that you will get stronger, but please…don't lose the light that I know you hold." She said with tears gathering in her eyes.

Naruto was surprised by this, "I promise Sakura-chan."

Sakura laid her head against his chest, "I'm glad."

The time passed quickly and the time of the funeral quickly came for Hiruzen. Naruto was one of the few chosen to talk for him. Everyone was gathered at the Hokage Tower, there was no one that didn't feel like the man was like a grandfather or a father. He had that effect, he was great in battle, but even better when it came to making people feel loved.

It was time for Naruto to speak, and he was having trouble speaking. Then he just got a sudden drive.

"Sandaime-sama…was one many could call a grandfather, I was one of those people. He cared for me like I was his blood." He paused to take a breath, "One of his greatest qualities was not his battle prowess, but his compassion for the village. He cared for everyone the same, not one more than another. He knew what we loved, what we hated…what made us sad…and what made us happy." He closed his eyes, unconsciously channeling chakra to them and turned to the coffin of Hiruzen and opened his eyes and his Mangekyou Sharingan was present, "It was easy to love him, he was hard to hate and was easy to trust, hard to be…doubted." Tears went down his cheeks, "Hard to forget all he has done for us. He cared for us his entire life and did not once forget the Will of Fire. He trusts that we will love one another and defend each other with our lives, right to the end." His Sharingan faded, "I promise him, that when I become Hokage…I will protect the village with my life."

Shortly after the event, everyone went home to mourn their own ways. Naruto continued to train, and he discovered his Mangekyou and decided to ask Itachi for help.

"The Mangekyou makes one blind with continuous use, as you can see with me. The light has begun to leave my eyes. Considering you have the body of an Uzumaki, I doubt you will go blind at all. My techniques include Tsukuyomi, known as moon reader, and one of the most powerful Genjutsu ever, only bested by Kotoamatsukami. My second ability is Amaterasu, known as heavenly illumination, and is the highest level of Fire Release jutsu." He paused to let Naruto soak it in. "Powers are usually genetic but are usually never the same within two people. To use an ability, channel chakra to the specific eye. Such as my Amaterasu, it is used with my right, and Tsukuyomi with my left."

Naruto nodded, and when he channeled chakra to his right eye, the area he looked at burst to black flames, he channeled chakra to the flame and it disappeared. He did the same the same with his left eye and nothing happened. A voice in his head told him to use it on the Amaterasu flames. Naruto did so and the flames bent to his will, so they both found out that one eye summoned Amaterasu flames and the other controls them.

Itachi closed his eyes, "There is one more ability that every Mangekyou set has, Susanoo, it means he with the ability to help by all means." Itachi channeled chakra to both eyes, and red chakra cover him and the shape of a torso and head formed. And Itachi immediately shut it off, "And it is extremely chakra taxing."

Naruto did the same, and instead of red chakra, white chakra did the same as Itachi's red. A torso and head formed from the chakra, and it was extremely humanoid, like a god-like figure. Itachi was surprised by the appearance, but didn't let it show.

"Well I've taught you all I know of the Mangekyou, everything else that I know is within the Uchiha Library, and also, I updated it with new things I learned." Itachi told Naruto who nodded.

"Thanks Itachi-sensei." Naruto said with a smile.

"Any time Naruto-kun." Itachi replied with a smile

Naruto went to the Uchiha compound and before he entered, he was interrupted by Jiraiya.

"Hey Naruto, how are you doing?" Jiraiya asked.

"I…could be better." Naruto replied with a small smile.

"I know you wanted to ask about a training trip, but it'll have to wait. We have to search for my other teammate so she can become Hokage for the time being, and after that, I have to learn things about a secret organization." Jiraiya told Naruto.

"Just ask Itachi about Akatsuki." Naruto replied, getting a shocked look from Jiraiya.

"What?" Jiraiya asked, shock still on his face.

"You didn't know Itachi was in Akatsuki?" Naruto asked, getting a shake of head from Jiraiya, "I have my own ways of spying, and I learned he was in that organization."

"What spy network could you have that is better than mine?" Jiraiya asked, the only response is Naruto holding his hands in the cross seal, and a shadow clone appeared beside him. "Of course," Jiraiya smacked his forehead, "Why didn't I think of that?"

"You probably did, but you realized the chakra cost wouldn't be worth it." Naruto told him with a shrug.

"Have I ever told you were a genius?" Jiraiya asked.

"Yeah, but I could stand to hear it more." Naruto said with a smirk.

"Of course you would." Jiraiya said with a smile as he rubbed Naruto's head, getting a laugh from the teenager.

"Well, I'm gonna go hit the books, and read of more shinobi arts." Naruto said as he walked through the gates.

Jiraiya got Naruto's attention, "Tomorrow we are leaving to find my teammate, so I'll come get you."

"Hai sensei." Naruto responded.

The next day, Jiraiya got Naruto around six in the morning and they left when the clock hit seven. Naruto was wearing a dark grey hoodie with loose, short sleeves, and black ANBU pants with matching ANBU boots, and had black gloves that reached his knuckles and went to his elbows, and a black mask not unlike Kakashi's. As they were walking out of the village, Jiraiya brought up the Rasengan.

"You know, the Rasengan is incomplete." Jiraiya said, getting a raised eyebrow from Naruto.

"Incomplete?" Naruto asked.

"Yes, the Rasengan was supposed to incorporate a nature transformation. You sensei tried this, but he ended up creating the Chidori. I'm sure he taught it to you?" Jiraiya responded.

"Yes, he did teach it to me." Naruto replied, "What could be so hard about adding an element to the Rasengan?"

"Being able to sustain it. It would take a lot of concentration to be able to hold it with an element. The Rasengan is the pinnacle of shape transformation, adding a nature to it would mean more concentration." Jiraiya replied to his student. "The closest I've gotten is just by spitting fire onto the Rasengan. But there are more things you can do with the Rasengan, such as make it larger or smaller."

Naruto decided to make the Rasengan bigger, and succeeded with his great chakra control. He compacted it, making it more powerful and condensed. He next tried to add his lightning affinity to it, there was a spark of lightning, then an explosion. "You're right, it is hard to sustain, but my name wouldn't be Naruto if I didn't keep trying. And if I don't succeed then I'll train with Guy and Lee for a month." Naruto said, getting sneezes from two people in Konoha.

On the road, Naruto kept trying to add his lightning affinity to the Rasengan, getting closer after each try.

"Where are we going Jiraiya-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"Tanzaku town, one of my spies told me she was there." Jiraiya said as he looked forward, "How's your efforts coming along?"

"I can channel some Lightning chakra into it before it destabilizes. But I can feel that I'm getting close." Naruto said.

"Well don't get your hopes up, even I couldn't do it, and neither could the Yondaime." Jiraiya told him.

"I'll try again later, do you have any scrolls I can learn from right now?" Naruto asked.

"I have one jutsu scroll with some fire jutsu and earth jutsu." Jiraiya said as he gave said scroll to Naruto.

Naruto took the scroll and seallessly created ten shadow clones who grabbed the scroll and went to learn the jutsu.

By the time it was night time, they had arrived at Tanzaku town, and Naruto was tasked with going to the hotel while Jiraiya looked for Tsunade. One clone made it back to Naruto to return the scroll, and it dispelled, telling the other clones to dispel, giving Naruto the knowledge of the jutsu they learned. There was a knock on the door, and Naruto got up to open it, but sensed Itachi and another person. He opened the door to see Itachi in a black cloak with red clouds just like his partner.

"Hello Naruto-kun." Itachi said as he put Naruto under the Tsukuyomi.

Inside the Tsukuyomi realm, Itachi was informing Naruto of what was happening.

" _Kisame and I are here to capture you, but I will purposely let you go to make it seem genuine to my partner_." Itachi told Naruto before the Tsukuyomi broke.

"What do you say Itachi, should I cut off his legs to make him easier to transport?" Kisame said with a grin.

"How about I cut off your legs sushi?" Naruto remarked with a smirk, getting a growl from Kisame.

Naruto rubbed a seal on his hand and unsealed the Kubikiribōchō, surprising Kisame, "Where did you get that sword?"

"I defeated Zabuza, and he gave it to me as his dying wish." Naruto replied as he laid the sword on his shoulder.

"I'm sure you got lucky with him." Kisame said, partially right.

Naruto shrugged, "No one will ever know."

Kisame growled, "Can I just take him out Itachi?"

"Pain-sama wants him alive." Itachi replied while looking over his shoulder.

Naruto smirked and vanished, and appeared outside the hospital. The two Akatsuki members were hot on his trail, and Naruto was barely escaping. The reached a clearing, and Kisame caught up with Naruto and kneed him in the stomach.

"You really think you could get away from us?" Kisame questioned with a grin.

Naruto nodded, "Of course I did." Naruto turned into smoke.

Kisame's grin dropped, "A shadow clone?!"

Itachi slightly chuckled, but Kisame didn't catch it. Naruto was seeking out his sensei, and found him in a bar with a woman. He walked up to the white-haired perv and got his attention by poking his shoulder.

"Sup sensei, just got attacked by some S-ranked shinobi." Naruto said like it was no big deal.

Jiraiya seemingly sobered up, "What?"

"Itachi and his partner Kisame found me in the hotel, but Itachi put me under the Tsukuyomi and told me that he was going to let me go and Kisame didn't know." He reported, "I gave Kisame the slip with the old shadow clone trick."

"I'm sorry Naruto, I should've stayed with you." Jiraiya genuinely stated.

"It's fine sensei, there is no need to apologize." Naruto responded.

"But there is, Akatsuki is after the tailed beasts and I just left you alone." Jiraiya stated.

"And I told you, it is fine." Naruto said once more.

Jiraiya sighed, "We should get some rest and get to looking for Tsunade in the morning."

"Hai sensei." Naruto replied.

 **Well there is Chapter five, I hope you enjoyed, and please leave a review if you want to. I'll be back with chapter 6 within time.**


	7. Chapter 6

**Welcome to Chapter 6, hope you enjoy.**

A man was standing against a giant creature that had two people on its head. The man was alone, but with one creature standing behind him that appeared too made of wood. In an instant, the giant creature and man charged at one another.

The image faded away and a familiar blonde awoke from his slumber, "What is up with that dream?" Naruto asked himself.

"What dream?" Jiraiya asked.

"I just dream that I fight this large creature that has ten tails with hands on the tips of them." Naruto replied as he rubbed his head and got a drink of water.

Jiraiya rubbed his chin, " _That's odd, I've only heard of a creature like that from the Great Elder_."

"But the weirdest thing was the fact it was just me versus it." Naruto said.

Jiraiya's eyes widened, " _I heard something like this from the Great Elder, "You will train a boy that will face the world's greatest danger," perhaps it is Naruto._ " He then straightened up, "Well we should hurry and go find Tsunade."

Naruto nodded, "Hai Sensei."

They left the hotel about ten minutes later and checked all over the town. Naruto made ten shadow clones to assist in the search, and they found her in a bar around 7 at night, which is bad; with how small the town is and the twelve of them searching and it took them around ten hours.

They approached the bar and walked through the front door. They looked around to see the bar and about ten stools, and a number of booths around the room. In the corner booth they saw Tsunade and a brunette holding a pig. Jiraiya and Naruto began to walk over to her but was stopped by a man.

He motioned to Naruto, "He looks to be too young to be in here."

Naruto scoffed, "I'm a shinobi, which means I'm not too young for anywhere. I put on this headband and I gained all the privileges."

The man nodded, "Fine, fair enough." He then walked away.

Jiraiya and Naruto continued on their way to Tsunade and Jiraiya spoke first.

"Hey, Tsunade!" Jiraiya exclaimed, as if surprised to see her.

The blonde turned to Jiraiya and scoffed, not unlike Naruto did with the bouncer, "What do you want Jiraiya?"

Jiraiya lost his smile and turned professional, "Konoha wants you to be Hokage, Sensei was recently killed by Orochimaru."

Tsunade momentarily looked surprised, but the expression quickly faded, "Not my problem."

Nobody noticed Naruto's angered face, and Jiraiya continued, "Please Tsunade, let go of your past."

"No can do Jiraiya, that village took too much from me." Tsunade said as she shook her head.

Naruto got even madder, but Jiraiya spoke once more, "Tsunade, you're being petty, and spitting on Sensei's legacy, he would've wanted you to become Hokage since Naruto here isn't old enough."

Tsunade raised her eyebrow, "Naruto? What is his last name?"

Jiraiya replied, "Uzumaki."

" _Uzumaki?_ " Tsunade thought, and said, "You have another apprentice?"

Jiraiya nodded, "Yes, and I have a feeling that he will be better than the others."

"Even greater than the Yondaime?" Tsunade scoffed, "I doubt this child could be even as good as him."

Naruto scowled at this, "I'm tired of this." He whispered.

"You say something brat?" Tsunade asked.

Naruto looked her in the eye, "Yes, I did." He began to glare and release killing intent, "You have insulted the past Hokage, and you have insulted me and you don't even know me." He shook his head, "If anyone should speak bad about someone else, I should speak about you. You are being a baby about losing two close people. Guess what. You aren't the only one to have lost a brother and significant other." He growled, "You have no idea about what I have lost or better yet what I never had a chance to have."

Jiraiya began to sweat, "You might want to stop Naruto."

"Sorry Sensei, I need to show her the error of her ways." He replied. "Meet me outside Tsunade, we'll see who the brat is." He said as he walked outside.

Jiraiya sweatdropped, "I'm sure he didn't mean that." But he looked to see Tsunade wasn't there.

"She left when you shut your eyes." The brunette said as the pig oinked.

"Thanks Shizune." Jiraiya said as he turned to leave.

Naruto and Tsunade were standing across from one another in the street. A few leaves flew across along with the wind and Tsunade smirked.

"I bet I will only have to use one finger against you." Tsunade said.

Naruto shook his head with a chuckle, "Why is it that people with titles are cocky?"

Tsunade glared at Naruto, "I'll show you cocky." She said as she rushed Naruto and tried to flick him.

Naruto easily dodged her and chuckled again, "You actually already did show me cocky." He said as he sent his knee into her gut. "You let your guard down because you were surprised that I dodged you."

"Shut up brat!" She growled out and tried to punch him.

She was surprised when Naruto caught her punch, as was Jiraiya when he exited the bar to see it. Naruto fought back with a punch to her chest that sent her back a few meters. She growled once more and jumped into the air and tried to drop her leg onto him. She was once more surprised when he caught it again. He threw her leg away as he jumped and kicked her in the side. Naruto made a Rasengan, and it began to flicker with fire, but it quickly dispersed, and he took the attention off of it when he made another plain Rasengan and slammed into her chest.

She got up and looked at him, "If the Yondaime couldn't add his nature affinity to his technique, what makes you think you will?"

"I learn from the past and don't let it define me." Naruto replied with a shrug.

Tsunade seemed to be deep in thought then spoke to Naruto, "Tell you what. If you successfully add your affinity to it in a week, then I'll become Hokage," She pulled out a green gem necklace, "and I'll give you this."

Shizune and Jiraiya were surprised, and were surprised even more when Naruto replied, "Deal, one week and you'll come with us and I'll get that necklace."

Jiraiya shook out of his stupor, "Think about this Naruto, you haven't been able to do it this entire time, and now you're on a timer."

"Trust me Sensei, I haven't used all of my resources." Naruto said as he turned to him.

"What do you mean?" Jiraiya asked him.

"Shadow clones." Naruto replied.

Tsunade was surprised, "You taught him shadow clones! Most Jonin can't even make at most ten!"

"I can make way more than that Tsunade." Naruto said.

"How many?" Tsunade asked.

"I don't know at this time, but last time I checked, about one thousand." Naruto shrugged.

" _One thousand?_ " She thought.

Naruto turned around, "I guess I have some training to do."

Naruto nodded and jumped into the night. He went to a plains he saw on his way to Tanzaku. He nodded at the spot and after his hands went into the cross seal, around one hundred clones came into existence.

"Okay, we have a week to get this down, and we are trying for fire, wind, and lightning right now, but first fire." Naruto told the clones who nodded.

"Hai boss!" The clones chorused.

So for a week, the clones and Naruto worked on adding the element to the Rasengan, and they succeeded. After the first three days, they figured out the secret. They needed to shape it just like normal, but in the process they need to add in the element with pristine control. So Naruto had one hundred more clones refining their control on the element, so by the fourth day they continued on the Rasengan. Finally, by the sixth day, Naruto finished the jutsu, and did the same for wind and lightning.

For fire, the Rasengan basically looks like a flaming vortex. Wind looks like the normal Rasengan except lighter with barely visible wind blades rotating around it. Lightning sort of looks like the Chidori, except in the shape of a sphere above the palm. Naruto felt the jutsu was still incomplete, and increased the amount of chakra, and they increased in size and power. The blades became larger and more destructive, and sort of harder to control. But when he met with Tsunade the day after the last day of the week, this is how it went.

"I hope you're ready to lose Tsunade, or rather Hokage-sama." He said as he created 5 clones, and he signaled for two to do fire and the other two do lightning as he himself and another clone did wind.

She crossed her arms, but they soon dropped when two clones made a Rasengan that turned into a **Fire Release: Rasengan** , and then the others made a **Lightning Release: Rasengan** , and then Naruto made the **Wind Release: Rasengan**. She became even more surprised when they put their Rasengan into the air and spread apart from one another. Each of their Rasengans grew larger, forming their respective **Rasenshuriken**.

"Pay up Tsunade." He said as the jutsu dissipated.

She shook herself from her stupor and pulled her necklace from her shirt and handed it to Naruto, "I'll be honest brat, I didn't expect that."

"Well when you make a bet, you're bound to lose." Naruto said with a chuckle.

"I suppose you're right Naruto." She replied with her own chuckle.

Jiraiya then walked up to Naruto, "Good job Naruto, you have done what no one else has. You even made three variations."

"It is easy when you use about a hundred clones each day for a week without a break." Naruto responded.

Jiraiya chuckled, "You're right about that."

Naruto then shrugged, "We should be headed back to Konoha then." He turned to Shizune, "Pardon my manners, but I forgot to ask your name and the pig's."

Shizune blushed, "Don't worry Naruto-san, my name is Shizune," she then motioned to the pig, "and this is Tonton."

"Nice to meet you Shizune." Naruto said as he extended his hand for Shizune to shake and she did.

They were interrupted by a large explosion, and they looked behind them to show a large snake.

"Naruto," Jiraiya said to get his attention, "Didn't Orochimaru die?"

"Yes, but that isn't Orochimaru, it is his right hand man, Kabuto. He was one of his only men to survive." Naruto replied, "I got this."

Jiraiya stopped him, "That is Manda, the boss of the Snakes."

"So what, I have something better." Naruto responded as he walked forward.

Naruto bit his thumb, and wiped his blood on a seal that appeared on his left arm. A large explosion of smoke erupted, and cleared to show a large Kitsune with nine tails. Granted it wasn't the Kyubi, but it is a powerful summon from the scroll Jiraiya gave him.

"Hey Mori." Naruto said to the Kitsune.

"Hello Naruto-sama." Mori replied.

"Mind binding the snake?" Naruto asked.

"No problem Naruto-sama." Mori said as she slammed her paws on the ground, causing tree roots to surround the Manda who hissed in protest.

Everyone heard Manda shout, "Damn it! I'll kill you Kabuto for getting me into this!"

Meanwhile, Jiraiya and the others were surprised at Naruto summoning this fox. Jiraiya knew not of what the scroll could summon, or its limits. He has so far seen Naruto summon Sphinxes and now Kitsune. Tsunade and Shizune were mainly surprised at seeing a Kitsune using Wood Release.

"Thanks Mori, that'll be all." Naruto told the Kitsune after Manda disappeared in a show of smoke.

"No problem Naruto-sama." Mori said as she dispelled as Naruto jumped over to the roots to where Kabuto was.

Kabuto was wearing a black cloak with black pants. There appeared to be a something moving under the cloak, and Naruto was visibly disgusted.

"It's over Kabuto, give up, you have lost your leader and you can't hope to fight me along with the other Sannin down there." Naruto told the grey-haired medic.

"It is for the loss of Orochimaru-sama that I am here. I have no purpose now, and I wish to kill you and everyone in Konoha." Kabuto replied, and he pulled back his hood to show the skin of a white snake, and the markings that Orochimaru had.

"What have you done?" Naruto asked with a glare.

"I have absorbed Orochimaru-sama, gaining his abilities and the bloodlines of his followers." Kabuto said with a smile.

Kabuto then slammed his hands into the snake seal, and crystals sprouted from the wood, surprising Naruto. However, Naruto managed to dodge the crystals, and both of them landed onto the ground below. Naruto had to dodge another crystal, and he jumped over a wave of crystal spikes. He landed near Kabuto who discarded the cloak to show a snake sprouting from the stomach of Kabuto. Naruto then cringed when he saw a torso sprout from his torso, and it took the shape of the spider-like companion that accompanied Orochimaru to the exams.

From the snake-like companion's mouth came webs that nearly caught Naruto. Naruto saw the torso go back into Kabuto's chest and he had to dodge the snake that jumped towards Naruto. Naruto unsealed the Kubikiribōchō that turned into a smaller katana that Naruto used to remove the head of the snake. It turned out to be for naught as the head grew back almost instantly. Kabuto went through a couple hands seals and ended on the tiger hand seal and Kabuto created shuriken of crystal that had the strength of diamond. Kabuto shot the shuriken at Naruto who dodged them but almost didn't have enough time to dodge a spear of crystal from the ground, the crystal almost hit his stomach but he instinctually put his hands in the tiger hand seal, and a wall of fire as hot as the sun burst into position in front of him.

Naruto knew this wasn't Fire Release, and didn't bother asking himself about it and just bombarded Kabuto. He appeared behind Kabuto and sent a punch to his back, nearly breaking it and he sent another kick right where he just punched, causing it to collapse. Naruto didn't rest, and he appeared in front of Kabuto and kicked him in the nose and sent him into an earth wall that he created. He walked slowly over to Kabuto.

"I said what I meant, it's over." Naruto said.

Kabuto chuckled, "It's over when I say it's over." He said as he vanished and appeared behind Naruto.

Kabuto's fist shot forward into Naruto's back and Naruto flew forwards. Naruto quickly righted himself by grabbing the ground to act as an anchor and then pushing his feet on the ground to stop. When he reached a stop, he bent backwards to dodge a foot that was going for his face. He then had to quickly react to a kick behind him that was coming for him by placing his hands on the ground and pushing off of the ground. Naruto put his arm up to block another kick and Kabuto kicked off of Naruto's arm and landed in a three point landing before slamming his hands into the snake seal then slamming his hands onto the ground which sent a wave of crystals towards Naruto who jumped over them. Naruto landed behind Kabuto then they entered a taijutsu bout. Naruto sent a left kick to the right side of Kabuto that was blocked, then sent a right kick that was sent to the left of Kabuto that was also blocked, and Naruto didn't have time to block a left kick to his stomach that knocked the wind out of Naruto. Kabuto didn't relent and did a reverse left kick to Naruto's face.

Naruto landed 5 feet away, and he slowly got up wiping blood from his mouth. The air became dense, and the air around Naruto began to heat up.

" **END THIS SNAKE!** " The Kyubi shouted as he flooded the seal with his chakra.

Red chakra poured from Naruto and formed a cloak that formed a fox shape with 5 tails, his skin began to peel away and the chakra seemed to replace said skin. A face formed shortly after, with two glowing white eyes with a jagged mouth. Naruto let loose a growl that sent shivers down all of the present shinobi. Kabuto didn't have time to dodge as Naruto appeared in front of him with a fist in Kabuto's gut. Blue and black chakra began to gather in Naruto's face in the shape of a sphere before it shot forward and carried Kabuto away and exploded shortly after. Kabuto appeared in front of Naruto attempting to punch him in the face but Naruto caught the wrist with one of his tails and punched Kabuto really hard in the gut as Kabuto appeared to disappear.

Kabuto appeared a long distance away, panting with lack of energy, "I must train." He said as he disappeared.

Naruto sunk to his knees as the chakra dissipated and his skin came back, "Why did you do that?" Naruto asked the Kyubi.

" **You were holding back**. **I will not allow my host to get beat up as it is very embarrassing**." Kyubi replied and Naruto shook his head.

"I will not hold back next time." Naruto resolved.

Jiraiya, Tsunade, and Shizune landed near Naruto.

"Are you okay Naruto?" Jiraiya asked him.

Naruto nodded then cursed, "Yes I am."

"It's okay Naruto, there is always next time." Jiraiya assured Naruto.

"Thanks Sensei." He replied.

Tsunade put her hands on her hips, "Should we be going now?"

Jiraiya nodded, "Hai, let's get on the road."

They spent about six hours moving at shinobi speeds through the forests and reached Konoha around six o'clock. Half way on the trip, Jiraiya told Naruto of something.

"If you wanted, you could move into your father's house." Jiraiya told Naruto.

-Flashback-

 _Jiraiya and Naruto were walking through the Namikaze Compound, and Naruto asked Jiraiya something._

" _Is the Yondaime my father?" Naruto asked._

 _Jiraiya's eyes widened for a second, "Honestly…yes, he is your father." He looked to Naruto, "You must understand why…"_

 _Naruto interrupted him, "I understand why he did what he did, after all, how could he ask another to do what he himself couldn't?"_

 _Jiraiya smiled, "Exactly, and I'm pretty sure you realized the resemblance."_

 _Naruto chuckled, "Of course."_

-Flashback-

"I was actually planning on joining the Namikaze and Uchiha compound with fuinjutsu." Naruto replied.

"Okay, that is fine Naruto." Jiraiya replied and they continued on their way.

They arrived to see the civilians waiting for them, and Naruto noticed Sakura as well. When the civilians saw the small group, they began to cheer for the return of the last Senju.

They continued on to the Hokage tower and met with the elders.

"Good job, Jiraiya and Naruto." Koharu told the males, getting a nod from Homura as well.

"Yes, good job." Homura agreed.

Next Danzo spoke, "I assume you are ready to become Hokage?" He asked Tsunade.

"Hai." Tsunade replied.

Danzo nodded, "Then we will have the ceremony tomorrow."

"Okay then." Tsunade replied.

Naruto began to walk away but then asked, "Am I excused?"

Danzo replied, "Of course Naruto-san."

Naruto nodded and went to the Uchiha residence. On the way he met Sakura.

"Hey Sakura." He said with a wave.

"Hi Naruto-kun." Sakura replied.

"I was wondering," Naruto said.

"Hmm?" Sakura prompted.

"Would you like to go out with me to dinner tomorrow?" Naruto asked with his right hand on the back of his head, his smile shining.

Sakura blushed, "S-sure, Naruto-kun."

"Okay then, well, I have to get home, maybe get some training in." Naruto said as he gave Sakura a hug.

"Okay Naruto, well I'll see you tomorrow." Sakura replied.

"See you at, let's say, seven?" Naruto asked, getting a nod.

"Sounds good." Sakura responded.

Naruto nodded then ran off, seemingly happy. He arrived at the Uchiha district and went to the training grounds. He sat down in his meditative position and contacted the fox.

Naruto appeared in his mind, sitting in the plains right in front of the fox.

" **You need something Naruto**?" Kyubi asked.

"Yes, do you know what was up with that fire when I was fighting Kabuto?" Naruto asked.

" **Yes, after all** , **I'm the reason you have it**." Kyubi replied.

"What do you mean?" Naruto questioned.

Kyubi sighed, " **What you used was Scorch Release** , **a nature transformation that I possess**. **It isn't common even in the Shinobi world. I only know of a few people who possess the bloodline**." Kyubi informed. " **It is used by combining Wind and Fire Release to create fires hotter than the sun**."

Naruto nodded, "Will you train me in it when you train me in your other abilities?"

" **Yes** , **there would be no reason not to**." Kyubi replied.

"Thanks Kyubi." Naruto said.

" **Names Kurama kid**." Kurama said.

Naruto was shocked, "I thought I wasn't ready to know your name."

" **I have seen we are more alike than I thought.** " Kurama said.

Naruto smiled, "I'll see you later then, Kurama." He said as he extended his fist, and Kurama extended his own to connect with Naruto's.

There was a bright light, and Kurama's energy transferred over to Naruto. Naruto exited his mindscape to see that he was on fire, he was initially freaked out, but calmed down because of the lack of pain.

" _ **This is my chakra cloak**_ _,"_ Kurama said, " _ **It is the original manifestation of my power in my host**_."

Naruto nodded, and looked at his palm, then closed it into a fist. "It feels amazing, I feel at peace."

Kurama was shocked, Naruto just said that his power made him feel at peace. At PEACE. He is the manifestation of hate and Naruto feels at peace. Kurama shook his head, thinking, " _ **You are surprising, Naruto**_."

Naruto got up and released the chakra cloak and walked to his bed to get some sleep.

Naruto woke up the next day ready for Tsunade's inauguration. He dressed in a black sleeveless cloak with a grey shirt under that reached halfway down his thighs. He wore black pants held up to the knees with his black Shinobi boots. And to finish the outfit, he had black fingerless gloves that reached his elbows that reached the sleeves of the grey shirt and they had metal plates on the back of his hands. When he looked into the mirror he forgot how long his hair was, it wasn't as long as Jiraiya's, but still fairly long reaching almost to his midback.

He exited his house and jumped out of the compound to the Hokage tower. He made it as people began to arrive, and he jumped up to the top where Tsunade was sitting while holding the Hokage hat.

"Morning Tsunade." Naruto greeted.

Tsunade looked up and chuckled, "Why did I let you talk me into this?" Naruto shrugged, "You better be ready to take this hat from me brat." She said with a smile.

"Don't worry, I will be." Naruto replied with a smile.

The sound of the civilians and shinobi ready for Tsunade's inauguration got louder as time began to pass.

"Just let the words come to you, Tsunade-hime." Naruto said, as Tsunade raised an eyebrow at his name for her. "Jiraiya called you it, and you are the last Senju and also the granddaughter of the Shodaime. So it seems fitting." Naruto shrugged.

"Why are you giving me advice anyway?" Tsunade asked.

"I can sense your unease." Naruto replied, "I'm just trying to calm you down, I read in a book that to calm someone down you should remind them of good thoughts or let them know you have faith in them, which I do." Naruto explained.

"Thank you Naruto." She responded. "At least someone does."

Naruto shook his head with a chuckle, "Everyone down there believes in you, otherwise they wouldn't be here. Jiji believed in you, otherwise he wouldn't have chosen you."

"I suppose you're right." Tsunade replied with a small smile.

Naruto laughed and placed his hands on the back of his head, "When am I not?"

Tsunade laughed in response, "Okay, you can stop being arrogant now."

"I know." Naruto replied. "I believe in you, I'm going to go meet up with Sakura." He said as the elders walked up to the roof.

Naruto walked to the right side and jumped down and walked around to Sakura who just arrived. He snuck up to her and spooked her by poking her in the side. Sakura squeaked and turned around, ready to slap who touched her. Naruto caught her hand and laughed. "Did you just squeak?" He asked.

Sakura blushed, "Shut up." She said as she looked to the floor.

"It was very cute Sakura-chan." He said as he raised her chin, "Are you ready for tonight?"

Sakura's face resembled one of shock, then she remembered what they were going to do, "Hai, I am." She fiddled with her fingers.

"I can't wait." Naruto responded. They turned up to the Hokage tower as the elders began to speak.

Naruto didn't really listen until Tsunade began to speak, "From this day forward, I am the ruler of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, the fifth Hokage!"

People were soon dismissed and everyone went back to their business. Naruto left Sakura after telling her he would pick her up at seven. Back at the Uchiha compound, Naruto was training to open the third gate permanently. His chakra was slowly squeezing through the pathway, and after about half an hour, the gate opened and Naruto instantly felt the increase in power.

He looked to a clock and saw it was three in the afternoon. So to pass the time he went to the library to learn a new jutsu. Naruto thought his Earth jutsu repertoire was quite low. He found a jutsu called **Earth Release: Multiple Earth-Style Wall** , a jutsu that branches off of the original Earth wall jutsu. As the name says, it creates many walls that can also curve to prevent escape from the top. He took the scroll out to the training grounds and read the directions.

So Naruto read the scroll and set out to try the jutsu. His hands went through the necessary signs and he finished with the snake seal and six walls came from the ground and the tops of each wall curved to meet in the center.

"That was alright, although I might want to increase the speed." Naruto said to himself. "Let's work on a jutsu we already know."

He put his hand out and created a Rasengan, and tried to add his wind nature to it but it blew up on him. The Rasengan caused dirt to kick up and Naruto was blasted away, rolling to a stop. Cuts were all over his body, although they were quickly healing.

"So I guess I can't make it with just one hand, let's try two." He said as he put one hand out and created a Rasengan again, and he used his other hand to add the wind chakra. He noticed the Rasengan was about to implode so he dispelled it before it could. "So I still have to use a clone then." He created a shadow clone and created a **Wind Release: Rasenshuriken** without issue.

He then remembered what his teammates did in the chunin exams, and decided to try it himself. He created two clones and created a plain Rasengan, and one Shadow clone put in Earth chakra and the other, Fire. Since he hasn't done as much with his Earth chakra, the balance was not correct to create Lava chakra, and the Rasengan imploded before Naruto could react. Naruto came too to see the ground was scorched and as was his skin and both were repairing as Naruto was thinking.

Naruto created more shadow clones to work on developing his Earth chakra so he could try it again later, it might take a while since he might want to get his Earth affinity to the same as his Fire before he tried again, and he has developed his Fire affinity for a long time.

Naruto looked back to the clock to see it was six, so he went to go get dressed. He came out of his room in a black kimono with orange tribal designs and an orange belt, and he removed his headband as well, his hair was kept in a ponytail similar to his sensei's (Jiraiya). He left his house around six thirty and walked to Sakura's house and got there right at seven.

He knocked on the door and he saw Sakura's mother, "I suppose you're Naruto?" She asked.

"Yes ma'am." Naruto replied respectfully.

"Okay, come in, I'm gonna go get Sakura for you, you can call me Mebuki by the way." Sakura's mother told Naruto, who nodded.

He walked in to see that the house was very well kept, and wasn't that decorated. Sakura's mother, Mebuki came back.

"Weren't you Sakura's teammate?" Mebuki asked.

Naruto nodded, "Yes ma'am."

"It's a shame what happened to the Sasuke boy." Mebuki stated, getting a slow nod from Naruto.

"Hai, he was like a brother to me." Naruto replied.

"I can't imagine what that was like." Mebuki responded, "Are you alright?"

"Yes ma'am, I've dealt with the grief and moved on, despite how tough it was." Naruto replied, and they were interrupted by Sakura coming down the stairs and Naruto was stunned by how she looked.

Sakura was wearing a red dress that split along the left leg up to the knee, and she had cloth held by her elbows that was pink. She noticed that Naruto's mouth was hanging open and she closed in on herself and her face was a bright pink.

"You look really…beautiful, Sakura." Naruto said after he collected himself.

Sakura blushed even more, "Th-thanks Naruto-k-kun."

"Are you ready to go?" Naruto asked her.

"Yes," She looked to her mother, "I'll see you when I get home."

Mebuki smiled and nodded, "Yes, now you go and have a good time."

Naruto and Sakura were walking down the street, and Sakura asked him, "So where are we going?"

"It's a surprise." He chuckled, and he smiled when he saw Sakura pouting. "It'll be worth it, I promise."

Sakura was confused when Naruto was taking her up to the Hokage monument. She noticed he was taking her into the forest, and was confused…really confused, and worried.

Naruto laughed, "I'm not taking you out here to kill you, or anything else." Sakura nervously chuckled at that.

Naruto led her to a path blocked by large leaves, and Naruto moved the leaf to show a blanket with a small table. And the area seemed to be opened up to the descending sun, and the sky was an exotic red, orange, and purple. The plant life in the area was beautiful as well, roses bloomed, tulips glowed, and the trees seemed to be dancing. Naruto created two clones who unsealed two instruments, a violin and cello. The clones sat near the opening and began playing soothing music. There were already clones there, cooking a whole bunch of food, ranging from ramen, pork, steak, some vegetables and some other small things.

To say the least, Sakura was shocked. Her hand was to her mouth, and tears threatened to fall.

"It is so beautiful." She said slowly.

"Not as beautiful as you, I thought our first date needed to be special, I read that dates go better when the couple is alone. It removes the reluctance seen in public, and it gives more meaning to the communion taking place." Naruto told her.

The tears finally fell, and she jumped on him, her arms around him in a warm hug. "Thank you Naruto-kun."

"Anytime Sakura-chan." He said after he regained himself from his shock, and before he returned the hug. "You wanna eat?" He asked with a chuckle.

"Sure." She chuckled back.

They sat on the blanket, on opposite sides of the table. The clones brought the food over, and placed it down so everything was within reach. Sakura took into account the scent of the food, and felt like she was in heaven just from the smell.

"What do you want to try first?" Naruto asked.

Sakura gasped, "Are those syrup-coated anko dumplings?"

Naruto smiled, "Yes they are."

After the confirmation, she snatched a stick and ate it, going against what Naruto thought she would've done, expecting her to be more…"lady-like" according to social definitions. But he wasn't at all repulsed, and grabbed some of his own food, starting with his own food. He heard Sakura moan when she tasted the dumpling.

"This tastes amazing Naruto-kun!" Sakura exclaimed.

Naruto smiled, "Thank you Sakura-chan."

So they continued eating and talking about little things. When they finished, the sun began to set and Naruto set the next plan into action.

Naruto stood up and extended his hand to Sakura, "Come with me."

Sakura didn't hesitate and grabbed his hand, and Naruto led her along another path and she saw the sunset when they reached the top of Hokage Mountain. Once again she gasped in surprise.

"It's beautiful." She gasped out with wide eyes.

The sun was barely visible, and the colors from before were brighter. The stars began to peak through night sky. She felt Naruto embrace her from behind, and she settled into his arms.

"Thank you…Naruto-kun." She whispered, "This is a nice change of scenery from all the…things…that have been happening. How do you do it?"

Naruto's eyes almost closed, and Sakura could feel the sadness coming from Naruto. The plant life began to wilt as if it were sad just like Naruto.

"I…have had quite a bit experience with bad things." He whispered, "Sasuke wasn't the beginning for me."

Sakura turned in his arms and placed a hand upon his cheek, "What do you mean?"

His eyes closed all the way, "Ever since I could remember, I could feel the hate of people directed at me." He sighed.

"Who?" She asked with sympathy written on her face.

"The villagers, some shinobi." He looked her in the eye, "But I realized that they were hurting over the attack on the day of my birth. I was the only one born that day, and they need something to let their pain out on. I don't blame them."

Sakura's eyes filled with tears, "How do you do this? Continue on like nothing had happened."

"I merely dream of a time when people can understand one another." He smiled, "If I return their hate, only more hate will come. And I believe peace comes when people understand each other, when we can learn to love each other."

She smiled, "I envy you, just like I said during the exams. I envy your strength."

Naruto wiped her tears away, "You are strong in your own way. We all have different ways to show our strength."

"I love you Naruto-kun." Sakura said out of nowhere.

Naruto was shocked, "You what?"

She looked him dead in the eye, "I said I love you."

This time, Naruto's filled with tears, "I love you too, Sakura-chan."

Naruto has never had someone "love" him, sure he had the Sandaime, but that is different. The Sandaime was like a grandfather, it doesn't hold the same value as that of a parent. I'm not saying that it didn't have any value, just that the love of a parent is one of the strongest bonds there are.

They sat there, under the moon in each other's arms. After an hour, Naruto got up and Sakura followed him.

"Should I take you home?" Naruto asked with a smile.

"Yeah, although I don't want to leave you just yet." She replied with a smile as well.

Naruto chuckled, "How about this? If I don't have a mission tomorrow, I'll come see you."

"Sounds good Naruto-kun." She chuckled in response.

Naruto nodded and he took Sakura's right hand in his left, and they walked back down to the village to Sakura's home. Most of the villagers had gone to sleep, so there was no one in the streets. It was a nice quiet walk, and around the beginning, Sakura held Naruto's arm against her chest. And they made it to Sakura's home shortly, Naruto stopped them at her front door.

"I enjoyed tonight, Sakura-chan." Naruto said with a large smile.

"So did I." Sakura replied with a large, but not as large, smile.

Naruto hugged her close to him, "I hope we can do this again some time."

Sakura nodded, "So do I, I would really love that."

They separated, but were still connected at the hip. Their faces began to inch closer, before long their lips were connected, sharing their first kisses together. After a minute, they separated.

"That…was amazing." Naruto gasped out.

Sakura gasped as well when they separated, "I know, right?"

Naruto chuckled, "I guess I'll see you soon then?"

"You know it." Sakura replied with a smile.

She opened the door, and waved goodbye before the door separated them for the night. Naruto smiled wide, to the point his eyes were closed, and he jumped around.

He punched the air, "Alright!" He yelled to himself, and a man opened the window.

"Shut up! I'm trying to sleep!" The man yelled, and this repeated with a female, and again, and again…

Naruto rubbed the back of his head with a sheepish smile, and vanished into the wind. He appeared on the roof and was jumping in the direction of his home. He made it in record time and when he got inside, he jumped on his bed.

"That was amazing!" Naruto exclaimed to himself before getting up and ready for bed.

His sleep attire consisted of just pajama shorts. He liked it so he could train a lot with chakra control exercises. He opened his box of leaves with his wind manipulation and kicked off of the wall and jumped to the ceiling and flew the leaves to his body to where they stuck on his torso and legs that were on top of one another. After this, he shortly faded away into his sleep.

The next morning, Naruto awoke and let the leaves fall off of him, and he fell off as well. He got dressed in black ANBU pants with the matching boots, and a black vest that was zipped up, and a black shirt under it that had sleeves that reached his elbows, and gloves that met the sleeves, and metal plates adorned the back of his hands. He tied his hair up in a ponytail like last night and then he left his apartment before locking the door. He jumped onto the roofs and made it quickly to Hokage tower. He arrived in about ten minutes and jumped in through the window.

"Hi Tsunade-baa-chan." Naruto said when he entered.

Tsunade jumped, and Naruto had to dodge a paperweight. "Don't do that, Jiraiya does that enough."

"It's so much more logical, and takes less time." He said while point to the window behind him with his thumb.

Tsunade face palmed, "Fine, what did you want? I have to go and fix your friend Rock Lee."

"Could I go with?" Naruto asked, he shrugged, "I wanted to get some hands on with Medical Ninjutsu."

Tsunade shrugged in response, "Sure. Let's go."

They both walked to the hospital and went straight to Lee's room. They got there and saw Lee who was doing some one-handed pushups. Tsunade sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose.

Tsunade caught Lee's attention, "Rock Lee, get off the floor."

Rock Lee pushed himself up straight and saluted to Tsunade, "Hai Tsunade-sama!"

Tsunade rubbed her ears, "Quiet down!" She yelled.

Rock Lee nodded, "How may I help Hokage-sama?"

"Lay on the bed." Tsunade responded, Rock Lee nodded and appeared in his bed. Tsunade shook her head and walked to the bed while checking her clipboard. "So your arm and leg are broken yet you're still exercising."

"Hai." Rock Lee nodded, "I won't let this minor setback ruin my skills."

Naruto face palmed, and Tsunade spoke again, "Okay so I'm going to see all that is wrong and see what I have to do."

Rock Lee nodded, "Hai."

Tsunade placed the clipboard down, and she placed her hands in the ram seal and her hands began to glow teal and she hovered her hands above Rock Lee's arm and leg. Tsunade nodded in acknowledgment.

"Okay, so they are pretty messed up, your arm is broken in about 8 different spots and your leg is broken in 12. So the surgery I estimate has a 50 percent chance of failing." She said getting a nod from Rock Lee.

"I'll do it." Rock Lee told Tsunade, "My taijutsu is all I have, I will take the risk." He said getting a nod.

Naruto was watching carefully as Tsunade put Rock Lee to sleep. Tsunade noticed his attention and began speaking to him.

"It is pretty simple when you get into it, if you want, I can train you." Tsunade offered.

"I'd like that." Naruto replied.

"So I'm going to teach you a little bit right now." Tsunade told him, "First, you need to create medical chakra by using yang release in this case.(Just spit-balling in how it is done, I don't know how it is exactly) There is a technique known as mystical palm that can heal internal and external injuries, in this case, I have to use my chakra to heal the injury by acting as a replacement for the dead cells." She told him.

Naruto channeled chakra to his hands, and they glowed blue, then he changed the nature to yang release and it began to glow teal like Tsunade's hands.

"But be careful, too much chakra can do more harm than good." She warned him.

Naruto turned on his sharingan and looked at Tsunade's hands to see the amount she was using and when he matched the amount. And he moved over to Rock Lee and Tsunade moved over to where she was healing the leg, and allowed Naruto to heal Lee's arm. Tsunade was surprised with how easy Naruto got it, and saw that Rock Lee's arm was indeed healing. The risk lied in how the bones were healing and the repair of the nerves and chakra pathway. Naruto matched exactly what Tsunade was doing and luckily they were successful.

They were both finished within the hour. They woke Rock Lee up to tell him that he would have to stay the night and would be released the next day.

Naruto and Tsunade were heading back to the Hokage Tower and Tsunade decided to ask Naruto how he got the medical ninjutsu down so quick.

The only answer she got was when he closed his eyes and opened them when he looked at her to show his sharingan.

This made her gasp, "How did you get the sharingan?"

"Sasuke Uchiha preformed a technique that gave me his Uchiha abilities on his last mission." He replied sadly.

Tsunade looked at the ground, "I'm sorry Naruto."

Naruto smiled, "It's okay, I have accepted it."

"You are really strong to move on from the death of someone close to you." Tsunade said with a chuckle.

"I just don't let it weigh me down, the past is the past." Naruto replied with a smile.

Tsunade just gained a greater respect for Naruto, "You're right."

They got back to the Hokage Tower and Naruto asked Tsunade something.

"So…when do you think you could train me?" Naruto asked.

"When are you free?" Tsunade asked while looking through paperwork.

Naruto walked around the office while looking at the pictures of the Hokage, "I have a meeting today with Kakashi-sensei. I usually have meetings on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 3 in the afternoon to 7 in the afternoon."

Tsunade looked like she just remembered something, "Speaking of meetings, there is one tomorrow for those who were promoted for chunin. You're invited"

"Got it Hokage-sama." He said with a smile.

"You're dismissed if you have nothing else to say." Tsunade told him with a smile as well.

"Okay, see you tomorrow Hokage-sama." Naruto said as he vanished.

Tsunade chuckled and shook her head, " _That boy is a special one_."

There was a knock at the door and Tsunade told them to enter, and the door opened to show Shizune.

"Do you need something Shizune?" Tsunade asked.

"I have something that you need to know." Shizune said with a worried face.

Naruto had just got back to the Uchiha Compound and he figured he would work on his Mangekyou abilities before meeting with Kaka-sensei. He went to the training grounds and activated the preservation seals and activated his Mangekyou. He looked at a training dummy and channeled chakra to his left eye (sorry for the mistake in chapter 4) and it burst into black flames.

"I don't think it deserved that Naruto-kun." A voice said with a chuckle.

Naruto turned around with a smile, "What are you doing here Itachi?"

"I just thought I would check up on you." Itachi replied with a smile still on his face.

"Well I'm doing okay, are you?" Naruto responded.

"I'm as well as I can be." Itachi replied, his smile falling a little.

"What do you mean?" Naruto asked with a curious look.

"I'm sick, Naruto." Itachi told him. "I don't have long, I plan on leaving the Akatsuki."

"What's wrong?" Naruto asked, "Has it been diagnosed?"

"It seems to be hemoptysis. I have an issue with my lungs as well as with my cardiovascular system caused by my Mangekyou." Itachi replied.

Naruto seemed saddened, "Do you know how long you have?"

"2 years at most." Itachi responded.

Naruto was surprised, "Why are just now telling me?" He asked.

"I didn't know how to tell you, and also with everything else that is happening." Itachi replied while looking at the ground and was surprised when he found Naruto hugging him.

"I told Sasuke I would help you, that I would redeem you and bring you back." Naruto told him, "But now it seems I am once again helpless."

"It isn't your fault Naruto." Itachi told him, "It was my decision to follow through with the plan, and if I hadn't then the village wouldn't be standing. I am happy to have served my village." He finished with a smile.

"Jiraiya will take me on a training trip soon, I would like you to come with." Naruto said.

"I would like that, it would give me a chance to give you my final gift." Itachi responded.

Naruto let Itachi go and nodded with a smile, "Well I have to go meet Kakashi." He said before looking to the training dummy and dispelling the flames.

Itachi looked at Naruto dispel the flames with a smile, " _He is a really incredible shinobi_."

Naruto arrived in training ground 7 to meet Kakashi and saw that he was actually on time and sitting on one of the three logs.

"Nice of you to join me Naruto." Kakashi said without looking up from his book.

Naruto chuckled, "So what are we doing today Kaka-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"We are going to do some light training." Kakashi replied, and Naruto knew when he said light, it was far from light, but he welcomed it with open arms.

"Let's get started sensei." Naruto said with a smile.

"We need to work on your taijutsu and genjutsu, so I got Guy and Kurenai here to help. Go ahead and create 450 shadow clones, and split them into three groups." Kakashi told Naruto. "Next apply the resistance, gravity and chakra seals to yourself."

Within time, Naruto finally got his seals to disrupt his control, so he activated the three seals and he fell to a knee.

"Okay, get up and run laps around the training ground, and after every 20 laps, do 1000 push-ups and sit-ups." Kakashi told Naruto.

Naruto started his laps, and 150 of his clones worked with Kakashi and 150 with the other two. The clones with Kakashi applied chakra seals to themselves and worked on chakra control as well as control with the elements. The clones with Kurenai worked on Genjutsu and the clones with Guy worked on learning the Goken taijutsu style.

When it was around 7, the training ended, and Naruto was pretty exhausted but had plenty of energy. It really amazed Kakashi with his student's stamina. But after the training was done, Naruto went to the compound and took shower and got ready to go see Sakura.

After his shower, Naruto got dressed in a long sleeve grey shirt and black ANBU pants with black ANBU boots, and he put his hair up in a low ponytail. He exited the compound and began walking to Sakura's house with his hands in his pockets. With a smile, he approached Sakura's home and knocked on the door.

The door opened to show Sakura, "Hey Sakura-chan, you still free?"

"Yeah, just let me get my coat." She said with a smile.

They began walking down the street with Sakura looping her arm through Naruto's.

Naruto turned to her, "Have you had dinner yet?"

"Yes I did, sorry Naruto-kun." Sakura apologized.

"Don't apologize Sakura-chan, it's okay." Naruto said with a smile.

Sakura nodded and they continued to walk. Naruto broke the silence once more.

"Do you have anything you want to do?" He asked.

"I just want to spend time with you." She replied with a smile.

Naruto nodded and they continued to walk, and Sakura was confused when he led her down a path.

"It's okay Sakura-chan, I want to show you something." He said to her as to calm her.

Sakura nodded once again, and they kept walking. Naruto and Sakura eventually made it to a house that was in the woods. Sakura looked at him curiously, and he just chuckled while leading her inside.

"This was my parent's home." He told her while he led her to a picture of his parents.

The picture contained a man that looked very similar to Naruto except with shorter hair, and a woman with long, red hair. Sakura began to think of where she saw the man, and it hit her.

"Your father was the Yondaime?" Sakura asked with almost a whisper, getting a nod. "You're not joking with me right?" She asked.

Naruto gave a negative nod, "I had it confirmed by Jiraiya of the Sannin." He pointed to the woman, "That is my mother, her name was Kushina Uzumaki. I was given her name as to protect me from my father's enemies."

Sakura looked to Naruto, "I never would've guessed." Her mouth slightly open.

Naruto chuckled, "You might want to close that mouth before you catch a fly."

Sakura blushed and lightly smacked Naruto, and Naruto led her into a room that had books and scrolls all over. There was table with papers sprawled over it, and Naruto led her to it.

"This is my research pertaining to things like science, biology, and fuinjutsu." Naruto informed her.

Sakura was once again surprised by Naruto as she saw applications to his genius. "You came up with these things?"

Naruto nodded, "Most of it, some of it I found and capitalized on." Some of the science related things he found from some labs he found that he suspected came from Orochimaru.

Naruto found quite a bit from it when he was younger, some things including some blood samples, and notes of experiments.

-Flashback-

An eight year old Naruto was roaming the woods and he tripped over what appeared to be a handle. He picked himself up and walked to the hatch and opened it and climbed down the ladder that he saw. At the bottom of the ladder there were various different lights, such as red and green. In one of the green light rooms were test tubes with what appeared to be people. He looked around and found a clipboard, and began to read it. He discovered that these people were being used in an experiment to bring back the abilities of the Shodaime. He saw some blood near and decided to take them for whatever purpose. After finding out what he could of the room, he left to another with red lights.

He looked for a clipboard like in the last room, and once he found that generic bloodlines were being attempted to be recreated such as Jugo's natural energy ability. He took the samples from the room as well and continued to explore, taking any DNA he could find and he could only imagine how angry Orochimaru would be to find that his material had been stolen.

-Flashback End-

After Naruto had given Sakura a tour of the house, they had left to go watch the sun set. They arrived just in time, as they saw the beautiful purples, the blues, and the reds, and oranges. And they looked higher to see the stars that had already appeared, desiring to show how bright they could shine. Naruto and Sakura had laid on the edge of the mountain above the Hokage Monument, watching the stars, observing the beauty of the beyond.

Naruto decided to show off a bit and wanted to show Sakura a little trick.

He nudged her with his shoulder, "You wanna see a little trick?" He asked with a smile.

She nodded, "Sure."

Naruto smiled, "So this is a jutsu I learned a bit ago, and one I improved."

He put out his hand and Sakura could see a blue ball materialize in Naruto's palm, next, if Sakura was looking at Naruto's eyes, she would've seen his normal blue eyes shift into a black with three overlapping red ellipses. And Sakura was still looking at the ball and was surprised when it burst into black flames.

She reached for it but Naruto pulled it away, "You can't touch it, these flames are special in the fact they don't extinguish and will turn whatever it touches to ash."

Sakura made an o with her mouth, "That is amazing Naruto." She looked up to his eyes, and they were back to their normal blue.

Naruto pointed the Rasengan away from her and dispelled it. "Jiraiya of the Sannin taught the sphere part to me, the black flames was my idea."

"You are so amazing Naruto." Sakura told him.

"Not any more than you are." He responded. "I love you."

"I love you too." Sakura replied with a smile and they leaned in for a kiss. They parted and Sakura spoke, "You wanna take me home?"

"If you are ready." Naruto replied.

"I'm ready." Sakura replied as Naruto stood and took her hand.

They walked back to Sakura's house and they said goodbye at her door with a kiss. Naruto left to his own abode, and went to his room. He got dressed for bed which included black shorts and that was it. He performed his daily routine, which included sitting on the ceiling with leaves attached to himself, and it was more difficult due to the seal he applied to himself.

Naruto then went into his meditative trance, and he received a vision.

 _Naruto was standing in what appeared to be a battlefield, his hands went into the snake hand seal and wood sprouted from the ground and it circled a beast with ten tails or arms swirling behind it. He said to himself, "I am not alone." And ethereal figures that resembled Asura and Sasuke appeared behind him._

" _My dreams or visions are really strange_." Naruto thought to himself as he entered back into his trance.

Naruto awoke the next morning and went to the training ground 7 to meet with Kakashi before the promotion meeting. He got dressed in his clothes he met Sakura in yesterday and left the compound and jumped to the buildings before jumping to the training grounds. He arrived to the common scene with Kakashi on a log reading his smut.

"Good morning Kaka-sensei." Naruto greeted to his grey-haired sensei.

"Morning Naruto." He replied without looking up from his book like always. "I wanted to get in some taijutsu training before your meeting with the Hokage."

"Got it sensei." Naruto replied with a smile.

"I want to try and work on my eight gates abilities, and I know you know them, so let's limit ourselves to the first gate." Kakashi told Naruto after putting his book away and jumping from the log.

Naruto nodded, "Well I already permanently opened the first three."

Kakashi's lone eye became wide, "What?"

Naruto nodded, "I slowly opened the gates because I never heard of it being done before and I have done it to the first three gates."

Kakashi rubbed his forehead, "Okay then." He then crossed his arms and forcefully opened the first gate.

Kakashi then rushed Naruto before the blonde could react, and went for a punch that sailed over Naruto's head after he bent backwards. Naruto quickly blocked a kick to his back with his left shin and went jumped before attempting a backwards left kick that Kakashi struggled to block but ended up pushing away. Kakashi brought up his arms in a cross to block an overhead kick and he grabbed Naruto's leg and threw the boy into a tree and the tree couldn't stand the force and snapped in the area of impact.

Kakashi barely blocked a kick to his side, and couldn't block another kick that impacted his face. He slowly got up and rubbed his nose, " _Kami can he kick_."

Kakashi jumped over Naruto who attempted the Dynamic Entry, and then landed and shot towards Kakashi with a left punch ready to be let loose. The fist impacted with Kakashi's forearms and Kakashi was sent backwards into a rock.

" _I need to improve my Taijutsu if I want to keep up with my student_." He thought and his eye widened before he quickly dodged a kick that hit the rock behind him that exploded into a bunch of tiny bits. " _Such power._ "

"Okay Naruto, that's it." He said while panting and rubbing his back.

"Are you okay sensei?" Naruto asked with concern while he was panting a little himself.

Kakashi nodded, "Yeah, I just need to rest for a bit."

"Okay, well I should get going to the meeting, thanks for the spar Kaka-sensei." He said with his left hand in his pocket and his right hand waving before he walked off.

" _I'll never stop being surprised with him._ " Kakashi thought to himself with a smile under his mask.

Naruto was jumping to the Hokage tower and made it there in ten minutes and waited for another ten outside the meeting room and entered along with everyone else. The room was dark except for the bright light being emitted from the candles placed around the room.

Tsunade addressed the people present, which included Naruto, Shikamaru, and the Jonin instructors. "I have invited you two here for the pleasure of promoting you." She motioned for Shikamaru to come forward first. "For your great performance and your great mind, you, Shikamaru Nara, are promoted to Chunin." She handed Shikamaru a Chunin vest and then motioned Naruto to come forward, "Naruto Uzumaki, due to your skills and performance, you are promoted to special Chunin."

Naruto accepted his vest and stepped back with a smile.

"The duty of a Chunin is greater than that of a Genin, as you must lead others and must have the ability to complete an objective." Tsunade addressed them. "I am proud to promote you two and I know you will do great in your futures."

The meeting was over shortly after that, and Naruto exited with Tsunade.

"So," Tsunade said getting Naruto's attention, "I plan on training you on whatever day you don't meet with Kakashi."

Naruto nodded, "Okay, so also Saturday and Sunday?"

"Yeah, but for less time on those days." Tsunade replied.

"So what are we going to start with?" Naruto asked, eager to learn.

Tsunade smiled at Naruto's eager smile, "First I'll have you read up on anatomy and the basics, and you can have your clones do that as I train you in evasion."

Naruto nodded and they walked to the Hokage's training ground and began on Naruto's training in the medical arts.

 **Sorry for the delay, and I hope you enjoyed the chapter.**


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